


Local 277

by KonkeyDongCountry



Category: Original Work
Genre: Alternate Universe, Attempted Murder, Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Demonic Possession, Distrust, Gen, Major Character Injury, Mind Control, Multi, Murder, Other, Paranoia, Parasites, Portals to Hell, Survival Horror, Whump
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-01-21
Packaged: 2021-03-14 20:07:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 11
Words: 39,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28676421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KonkeyDongCountry/pseuds/KonkeyDongCountry
Summary: Eighty years old, completely surrounded by a tall iron fence and boasting ten floors of seldom traveled paths, secret nooks and hidden rooms frozen in time, the Callahan power plant gives off a slightly haunting aura. A round brick watchtower looms over the building, adding to its atmosphere.Apprentice pipefitter Bailey Cooper has been captivated by the watchtower since his first day at Callahan. It calls to him, beckoning him to investigate its seemingly inaccessible entrance.Bailey and his crew are asked to come in on a Friday and work overtime, none of them aware of the horrors that lurk within the tower. At 4:30 that evening, the plant's only exit gate permanently shuts, a mob of robed cultists surround the building and the portal in the tower opens, bringing forth unspeakable terrors.One by one the guys are corrupted by the eldritch abominations dwelling in the plant's darkest corners. As tensions rise, paranoia and distrust run rampant. Some of the group are no longer who they claim to be.With no way of telling who's infected and who's still human, Bailey realizes that the man he trusted an hour ago might now be someone to fear.Re uploaded  from my old account.
Kudos: 4





	1. The Callahan power plant

**Author's Note:**

> This is re uploaded from my old account. I took down the original version, gave it a make over and improved upon it.
> 
> I'm an electrician, and the Callahan power plant is a fictionalized version of a place I've worked at. It's a really neat building and actually does have ten floors loaded with ancient equipment, an old coal loading area, secret hideouts and disused, very out of the way rooms you won't find unless you actively go looking for them. The building's watch tower, which had been unused for decades by the time I worked there, piqued my attention right away and I was curious about what might have been in there at one time. The tower was demolished in the fall of 2019, and one day I thought to myself, "What if there was a portal to hell in that tower?" Thus the inspiration for this story was born.

Looming over the bank of the Mississippi river, the Callahan power plant could only be accessed from a forest shrouded service road. Beyond the building’s tall iron entry gate, hundreds of lights blinked against the early morning sky. The sun was just beginning to crack the horizon, casting the whole exterior of the plant in a pinkish orange glow.

Built in 1941, the plant had seen many remodels and expansions over its lifetime. Standing at ten stories tall, the original section of the building resembled an art deco era high rise, while the newer additions spread out horizontally from the first floor. It was accompanied by an old brick watch tower that was nearly twice the height of the plant itself. No one was allowed up in the tower anymore, but it offered an astounding view of the surrounding woods and the city skyline far in the distance. From its top deck, one could see out nearly fifteen miles.

The plant’s first floor was host to a multitude of contrasting looks and styles, each reflective of a different time period. The tan porcelain tiles adorning the west wall were original, while the interior side of the north wall was newly sheet rocked and freshly painted. The newer area housed the employee break rooms, lunch room, locker rooms and all the offices, while older areas towards the back of the building, untouched for decades, featured long forgotten boilers and cracked concrete flooring underneath a maze of lead coated beams and asbestos insulated pipes. The recently renovated shipping and receiving area was wide open and cavernous with a scrolling track mounted yellow bridge crane that slid back and forth on the ceiling. The area had been remodeled nearly a dozen times, but the plant’s four original generators remained on their cement pads in the center of the cargo bay. They hadn’t been run since the sixties, but were kept around to add to the vintage charm of the place.

The upper floors consisted mostly of scaffolds, ladders, small equipment pods and networks of catwalks, all joined together by one central staircase. Each subsequent level got smaller, narrower and more difficult to navigate before plateauing at the spacious and wide open tenth floor. From there the stairs continued upwards towards the roof access deck, and the walls stretched up beyond that point for another fifty feet before finally meeting the ceiling. Looking over the tenth floor’s guard rail provided a vertigo inducing view of the main floor far below.

The plant had a reputation of being a rather spooky place to work, especially after hours. Each floor had many secret nooks and hidden rooms frozen in time, but only those willing to explore the deepest, most isolated parts of the building would find them. A lot of the original machinery remained, disconnected and fossilized, bonded together by fifty year’s worth of cobwebs. Old and new installations intertwined in unique ways, as in many areas it wasn’t feasible to remove the ancient equipment. 

Some plant employees described the upper floors as mildly unsettling, but the basement had an especially foreboding feel that no amount of shiny new equipment could erase. Even on a bright sunny afternoon, onyx black shadows seemed to slither out from dark corners. Electrical conduits branched out like arteries from subpanels, bringing power to the furthest reaches of the building while many abandoned pipes, dead and forgotten, hung uselessly from their brittle supports. Long dormant coal burning furnaces rusted next to brand new instruments. Layers of soot stained the cracked cinderblock walls, making them resemble an endless black void. Thick, rusty chains, their load bearing hooks long gone, hung from the ceiling, and years worth of now meaningless writing had been scrawled along the walls in many places. It wasn’t uncommon to hear a rickety, almost sinister creak or groan emanate from somewhere deep within the basement with no apparent cause. The more imaginative employees tended to get creeped out when working down there alone, and a couple were convinced the place was haunted. On several different occasions, people claimed to have seen a figure dart out from a desolate corner or to have heard footsteps right behind them only to turn around and find themselves alone.

Despite its creepy reputation, the Callahan plant was also known as an extremely safe place to work. Job site safety was taken incredibly seriously, and the plant boasted a very impressive record. No one had suffered a serious on site injury in nine years, and there hadn’t been a job site fatality since 1971. Many safety rules were rigidly set in place, and anyone who ignored or simply chose not to follow them would get laid off the next day.

To twenty four year old Bailey Cooper, Callahan was the perfect place to work. Due to all the old equipment and the building’s unique floor plan, each project brought many new puzzles to solve and he wouldn’t want it any other way.

Lithe and exactly six feet tall, Bailey was a third year apprentice pipe fitter. He had short brown hair, intense blue eyes, had both ears gauged to size 00 and wore a deep purple welding hat that was made from Crown Royal bags. Unlike most of his friends, he could say with complete honesty that he liked his job. He enjoyed working with his hands and couldn’t see himself doing anything else. The mere thought of being hunched over a desk working a soulless office job made his skin crawl. Ever since he was young he’d enjoyed solving puzzles, so working in a place like Callahan gave him a daily mental workout as well as a physical one. It kept him in shape, as on any given day he was climbing scaffolding, lifting heavy objects and installing new pipelines. Whenever there was work to be done a tight space, the task was often given to him. He didn’t really mind, as most of the older guys had lost a lot of their flexibility. Bailey was the kind of person who needed to be kept busy to ward off boredom, and he’d take slinking in and out of confined spaces over filling out paperwork any day.

Today was one of the few days that left him incredibly bored.

Along with his nine equally miserable colleagues, he was stuck in what would be a dreadfully long safety meeting. It was all common sense stuff; don’t cross danger tape, tie off when working at heights, don’t weld without a tinted face shield and other things that everyone knew already. Bailey understood why they had to amp up the safety meetings as they prepared for the upcoming turnaround, but sitting through them never ceased to be difficult. Project manager Jason Schmitt was reading off a fifteen page packet in his emotionless, monotone voice which only made it worse. A site visit from Jason almost always resulted in a drab safety meeting. He wasn’t a bad guy, but he seemed devoid of personality and didn’t have a clue how to captivate his audience.

Bailey picked a shard of plastic off the table as he half listened to Jason drone on about how many man hours the job was at. He fought the urge to glance at the time.

Sitting directly across from him was Noah, his best friend and fellow apprentice. The two had known each other for five years, and Noah had initially applied to local 277 on Bailey’s recommendation. He had soft brown eyes, long wavy brown hair that he kept tied back and wore black rimmed glasses. A self described gaming nerd, he had an impressive collection of games ranging from late seventies Atari titles to the newest Playstation releases and had helped Bailey discover more than a few hidden gems. At twenty one, Noah was the youngest guy on the crew, but he was invested, eager to learn and had a great attitude. Though he was only an apprentice himself, Bailey did his best to teach Noah new things as he learned them.

To Noah’s right sat Jay, the primary welder. He was demolishing a sandwich that had five different kinds of sliced deli meat on it. He was thirty seven but had the metabolism of a teenager, as he stuffed his face with salty, greasy food every day but didn’t gain a pound. Tall and skinny, he had light brown eyes, a friendly face and tousled blonde hair that was usually hidden underneath his red welding cap. Jay veered towards the ditzy side, tried to make friends with everyone he met and often got excessively exited about little things the same way a child does, but he was one of the best welders in the state. His welds had never failed an X ray and wouldn’t come apart unless they were melted with a superheated blow torch.

Cameron sat in silence across from him. The two were complete opposites. While Jay was almost obnoxiously friendly, forty year old Cameron was very introverted. He liked one on one conversations, but would usually loiter quietly in group discussions. His ice blue eyes, slicked back dark brown hair and olive tinted skin tone paired with his default neutral facial expression made him look like a stereotypical mafia hitman, and people were often nervous to approach him. He got along with the other guys well enough and even had some post work beers with them on rare occasions, but he couldn’t call any of them real friends. He’d always been the lone wolf type, and while he sometimes joined in on the break time conversations, he preferred to spend breaks in silence outside, getting lost in his thoughts while savoring a cigarette.

At the next table over, the four other journey level fitters did their best to try and pretend they were paying attention.

Forty six year old Terry was looking in Jason’s general direction, but his mind was elsewhere. He had short brown hair, light brown eyes, a square jaw and a five o clock shadow. The tallest and broadest of the guys, Terry looked intimidating but in reality he was a big soft teddy bear who never lost his temper. He had a different welding cap for every day of the week, and he’d made them all himself. He wasn’t ashamed of liking to sew either and didn’t feel the need to hide it. He’d argue that it was manly to openly have a girly hobby. Occasionally some of the older, more homophobic guys on the site would call him gay for it, and Terry, who had a great sense of humor, would drive them off by winking at the guy and jokingly saying, “Only for you, daddy.” Doing so always triggered the infectious, hyena like laugh of his good friend and colleague Waylon.

Sassy and outspoken, Waylon was originally from Tennessee and had worked there for fifteen years before migrating north. Despite having lived in Minnesota for the past ten years, he never lost his strong southern accent. He was forty eight years old and had hazel eyes, brown hair, a well defined jawline and a nice smile. While he did have some stereotypical southern hick traits, such as his affinity for chewing tobacco, he still had all his teeth and wouldn’t be caught dead flying a confederate flag. He liked playfully teasing people and was easy to get along with, but he took his job very seriously and had a zero tolerance policy when it came to idiots and slackers.

Thirty one year old Eric frowned as he took a sip of his lukewarm Coke. He’d just bought himself a new insulated lunch box, but it had failed to keep his drink cold and he was left disappointed. He had dark brown eyes, short black hair, dark skin, an intricate series of tattoos winding up and down each arm and wore an American flag printed bandana around his head. While not as withdrawn as Cameron, Eric considered himself to be on the introverted side as well. He was intelligent, enigmatic and known for being a great listener. He was also very observant and could read body language better than any of the other guys. If anyone had a problem or simply needed to vent, he could always tell. He was no therapist, but he’d rather listen to someone else bitch and moan than open up about his own problems.

Beside him, Sam discreetly typed and sent a text as he held his phone underneath the table. He was forty two and had blue eyes, brown hair, had a tattoo on the left side of his neck and was never seen without a hat. When he wasn’t wearing his hard hat, he had his grey Highland Mechanical hat on. He wasn’t going bald, but he wore hats so often that he was starting to think that he looked stupid without one. Barely 5’6’’ and 130 pounds soaking wet, Sam was small enough that a guy like Terry could easily pick him up and carry him away without much effort, though he didn’t let that hinder him. In addition to being fairly extroverted, he was an outdoorsy person who enjoyed hunting, fishing and spending nice fall evenings at his cabin up north.

Flanking Jason in the center of the room were the two foremen, Jeremy and Pete.

Jeremy was the assistant foreman, and he looked like he would rather be any place else. He was tall, slender and lanky with green eyes and brown hair that was getting a little long. He had a bit of an overbite and wore an emerald colored welding hat that complemented his eyes. While he was technically a foreman, he spent more time doing construction work than filling out papers, sending emails or meeting with Jason. That was fine by him. He wasn’t organized enough to keep track of everything and was more than happy to leave most of the paperwork for Pete. Jeremy was forty two, but when it came to cute pets he always fawned over them like a five year old. He’d shoot birds and deer all day, but the presence of a puppy or a kitten would reduce him to a giddy, giggling mess, though he’d never admit that to anyone at work. He was a firm believer that a house wasn’t truly a home without a furry four legged companion.

Pete, the general foreman, was actually paying attention to the safety topics, but only because he had to. It was all stuff he’d known for thirty years, but he had to smile and nod anyways to appease the higher ups at corporate. Pete was on the portly side, had brown eyes, a mustache and wore wire rim glasses. At fifty eight, he was lucky enough to still be sporting a full head of hair, even if it was getting more grey with each passing day. He was mere months from retiring, but still took immense pride in a job well done. Unlike some foremen, he was quite laid back and easy to get along with, though he could be stern when he needed to. The fact that he was a gamer like Noah, let alone a good one, took most people by surprise, and he had once demonstrated his skills by annihilating both Noah and Bailey in an online Call Of Duty match. His victory lead to him collecting over two hundred dollars from the guys who’d bet on him to lose.

After a long grueling hour, Jason finished his meeting, exchanged a few words with the foremen, wished them all a good day and headed out.

Pete and Jeremy exchanged an uneasy glance. Neither of them wanted to be the one to say it, but they had to relay the message they’d been given before the meeting.

Bailey knew what that look meant, and he prayed he was wrong. Usually he loved overtime, but he had plans for the weekend. Waiting for him at home was a brand new factory sealed copy of the Resident Evil 3 remake. Resident Evil was his favorite game series of all time, and as an avid fan of the original game, he’d been eagerly awaiting the remake since the day it had been announced. Now that he finally had the game, he was going to be irate if he couldn’t spend most of the weekend playing it. He narrowed his eyes in anticipation, waiting to see if he was going to hear those dreaded words. 

Pete adjusted his glasses and sighed in exasperation.

“I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I’m afraid we all have to come in tomorrow. The contractors met with me before lunch, and they want that rooftop process line in and ready to go by Monday evening.”

“You fucking serious? I haven’t even started grinding that thing,” Terry was aghast. 

“I know this is last minute, and I’m upset too, but I don’t make those calls. Jason has been riding my ass all week, and those contractors practically jumped me before break. I’m just telling you guys what they told me before the meeting. It sucks and I’m sorry, but they expect us to be here.”

“Looks like I’m not taking my son fishing tomorrow,” Sam scowled to himself.

No one was happy with the news, but some of the guys were more peeved than others. While Bailey was annoyed that he wouldn’t get to sleep in and spend the next day gaming, he could cope with some surprise overtime. He was single, didn’t have any kids and still lived at home with his parents, so it wasn’t like he had many commitments.

“To make this more bearable, we’re going to have Old World deliver some pizzas tomorrow.” Jeremy spoke up and pulled a notepad from his pocket.

Jay’s face lit up. “Ooh! What kind of pizza are we getting?”

“Any kind you want. We’ll get a pepperoni and a sausage and onion for sure, I think we can all agree on that.” Jeremy replied.

“How many are we going to get?” Bailey asked. 

“I was thinking five, but I know I’ll be hungry, so maybe six or seven. Possibly eight.” Pete said.

“Their meat lover’s pizza is so good,” Jay was practically salivating as he spoke.

Eric laughed and shook his head at him. “Man, you are more excitable than my three year old and she’s a hand full.”

“How about a BBQ chicken pizza?” Waylon suggested. “Those are always good.”

“Maybe. Are you talking with or without red onions? Answer carefully. The fate of our friendship may depend on it.” Terry said cryptically.

“With onions! What kind of degenerate do you think I am?” Waylon sassed back at him.

Jeremy jotted the requests down in his notepad. “Okay, so far I’ve got one pepperoni, one sausage and onion, one meat lover’s, and one thin crust BBQ chicken. Anyone else have a request?”

“Yes. Hawaiian with extra pineapple.” Noah spoke up boldly. 

“Uhh, are you sure about that?” Jeremy’s hand hovered hesitantly over his notepad. For all he knew Noah was trolling him.

“I’ve never been so sure of anything in my life.” Noah said with confidence.

“You’re a sick man, Noah.” Cameron said disapprovingly. 

“I’m not sick, you are. Pineapple belongs on pizza. Show of hands. Who agrees?” Noah raised his own hand high.

“Noah, I don’t think we can be friends anymore.” Bailey teased.

Noah crossed his arms and sulked. 

“You guys suck.”

**************************************************************************

The plant was unnaturally quiet at a quarter to six on Friday morning. None of the other trades were present, and besides the fitters, the only other people around were the crane operator who was going to help them and a few plant managers. Bailey was so used to ambient noise and constant activity going on around him that walking through the plant when it was deathly quiet almost felt surreal.

He headed down the stairs into the basement. The fitter’s main hub area was close by, and Pete was already unlocking all the gangboxes and material shelves.

“Morning Bailey,” he said pleasantly.

“Good morning,” Bailey responded. He spotted Cameron lurking nearby, silently sipping his coffee.

“What’s up Cam?” Bailey asked him.

“Living the dream. This is exactly how I love to spend my Fridays.” Cameron said.

“I sense sarcasm there.”

Cameron smirked and rolled his eyes but didn’t say anything else.

“Lighten up a bit, Cam. It’s Friday. We’re getting paid overtime. Double time if we have to come in tomorrow. You could at least smile a little.” Pete said.

“I will if you give me something to smile about,” Cameron shrugged.

“Hey guys!” Jay waved at them from the stairs, then tripped over his own foot and comically tumbled down the steps. He landed on his back and knocked his head against the stair railing.

Cameron nearly choked on his coffee as he failed to suppress a laugh. Bad things happening to Jay always brought a smile to his face. He didn’t outright hate the other man, but he often got annoyed at the welder’s overtly friendly behavior and positive demeanor. Jay was always asking him to hang out and never got the hint that Cameron wasn’t interested in being anything more than casual acquaintances.

“I spoke too soon, that was hilarious.” Cameron said.

Jay wasn’t hurt, though he was peeved about the state of his boots. “Son of a bitch. I just bought these boots yesterday, now they’re already scratched.” he whined.

“Hell of a way to start your morning, Jay,” Waylon said as he came down the steps. “A little on the dramatic side, but you do you.” he extended a hand and helped the other man up.

“I didn’t do it on purpose,” Jay dusted himself off.

Everyone else showed up over the next few minutes. Group motivation was low and they spent the first fifteen minutes bullshitting, talking about food and drinking coffee before even thinking about gathering materials. Out of the whole group, Bailey was the only one who didn’t drink coffee. He had a strong disdain for the stuff, no matter how jazzed up it was. He especially didn’t understand how Terry and Pete could drink it black with nary a drop of cream or a single grain of sugar. To him that was as baffling and horrifying as Noah and his love for pineapple loaded Hawaiian pizza.

After a lengthy ten man group discussion about which brand of smoker made the best brisket and the superiority of dry rubs over sauce, the guys finally dispersed and started getting ready for the day.

Most of them would be working up on the roof, but before anything could actually get done they had to bring up all the necessary equipment and materials. Bailey loaded up a cart with pipe stands, grinders, drills, blinds, hardware and other materials they’d need and brought it over to the plant’s only elevator.

Located in the core of the building, the elevator served as the plant’s spinal column and ran from the basement up to the tenth floor. It was old, finicky and often broke down. The elevator cabin was small and claustrophobic, and while Bailey managed to get the cart inside and squeeze Sam and Eric in with him, it was a very tight fit.

Graffiti from every decade adorned the off white inner walls of the elevator. Most of it was the typical ‘Dave was here April 1976’ or ‘I fucked Ted’s mom’ along with some random phrases and cartoon characters, but one piece captured Bailey’s attention every time he stepped into the elevator.

There was a symbol drawn in red on the right side of the rear wall. It was a circle with other detailed symbols and lines inside. In the very center of the circle was a large eye with a vertical, feline like pupil. Bailey traced his finger over the lines. The symbol had been drawn a long time ago and was likely the work of a bored employee who’d read too much Lovecraft, but it was articulate and deliberate compared to the hasty scrawl of everything else. Whoever drew the strange symbol had taken their time.

Sam pressed the button for the tenth floor, but the elevator doors didn’t close. He pressed the button again. Nothing happened.

“Well shit, that’s not a good sign,” he mused. “I think I broke it.”

“This thing’s really got a mind of it’s own, doesn’t it?” Eric asked rhetorically.

Sam prodded buttons at random in hopes of bringing the elevator back to life, to no avail. It was broken.

“You know what this means, right?” 

“You don’t even need to say it,” Bailey stated and prepared himself for the laborious trek that awaited him. 

He picked up as much stuff as he could carry and began trudging up the staircase. Ascending eleven flights of stairs while juggling several power tools was no easy task, and Bailey was exhausted by the time he reached the tenth floor. If he was lucky, he’d only have to make the journey three or four more times as long as everyone else helped out.

“This sucks balls,” Noah announced as he made it up the last step. He had several blinds looped over each arm and dropped them all on the floor by Bailey’s feet.

Bailey was tempted to dawdle and waste time, he wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible so he ventured back down the stairs to pick up another load.

On the seventh floor landing, he passed by Terry, who was panting and clutching his side. He looked ready to keel over.

“Do you smoke, Bailey?” he questioned.

“No.” Bailey responded.

“Take my advice, don’t ever start. Stairs are my nemesis now,” Terry explained.

He wasn’t the only one who was tired. After the second round trip, even the fittest members of the group were wiped out and had cramps in their sides.

Bailey was ready to drop from exhaustion after the last trip. He sat down to catch his breath and watched as Noah made his way up the steps again, this time carrying a pipe stand. He set it down and leaned against the railing to rest for a moment.

“Hey Bailey, have I mentioned that this sucks balls?” he asked sarcastically.

“Yeah,” Bailey said. “You have, and it does. At least we’re getting pizza today.”

*********************************************************************************************

Old World made a good pizza. It wasn’t overtly greasy, the crust was crispy on the outside yet soft on the inside, the sauce was bursting with flavor, and it had exactly the right amount of cheese.

After a crappy morning spent lugging equipment up ten stories and dealing with a myriad of technical problems, Bailey relished the pizza.

He polished off a slice of sausage and onion and immediately started working on another while trying to disregard the horrific scene in front of him.

Noah was ravenously eating his pineapple heavy Hawaiian pizza. Since no one else wanted any of it, he had the entire pizza to himself and was eating it straight out of the box.

Bailey stared at the pale yellow chunks of fruit on Noah’s pizza with revulsion.

“You enjoying that pizza, Noah?” he asked.

“Yes I am.” Noah smirked and stared Bailey right in the eye as he took a huge bite out of his slice. A cube of pineapple fell off and he flicked it at Bailey, but his attack was thwarted. Bailey saw it coming and deflected it, causing the fruit to sail away and land in the hood of Cameron’s sweatshirt. He didn’t notice.

Jay, who had the world’s worst poker face, did notice and snickered. 

“What?” Cameron glared at him with annoyance.

“Nothing,” Jay responded.

That small exchange distracted Bailey and gave Noah enough time to gather and fire more ammunition. He tossed a large chunk of pineapple at Bailey and hit him right between the eyes.

“Boom, headshot! You’re dead!” 

“Asshole! You got pineapple juice on my hat!” Bailey retaliated by throwing his untouched crust at his friend. It bounced off Noah’s shoulder and fell to the floor, where it instantly got covered in dust and metal shavings.

Jeremy, who was sitting to Bailey’s left and eating his unwanted pizza crusts, slumped in disappointment at its loss.

“I wanted to eat that,” he whined.

“You still can,” Jay picked the crust up from the floor and handed it to Jeremy. It shimmered with tiny metal shards. “It might be a little prickly though.”

Jeremy examined the crust, determining if the risk was worth it.

Cameron abruptly got up from his spot. “You guys are morons. I’m going out for a smoke.” He walked off, wearing the faintest hint of a smile.

Bailey just shrugged. “He’s not wrong.”

****************************************************************************************

After lunch, Bailey was back up on the roof. Down on the ground, Pete, Eric, Terry and the crane operator were getting ready to fly a pipe up to the roof, where everyone else would work quickly and efficiently to get it placed and secured.

Bailey watched them work for a few minutes to see where they were at. Once Pete gave the signal and the crane started lifting the pipe, he’d need to climb to the roof’s guard shack and get in position on the catwalk. 

In the meantime he walked to the roof’s edge to take in the phenomenal view. It was a beautiful clear day, and golden sunlight shone down upon miles of lush green forest with no freeways or high rise apartments to ruin the picturesque landscape. It was so calm and peaceful, and it made Bailey feel very relaxed.

From his position on the roof, he also had an excellent view of the watch tower. It was adorned with many rows of mid century modern lights, and they flashed at regular intervals. At the very top of the round structure, there were a dozen windows, some of which were cracked or broken from eighty years of being exposed to the elements. The tower had been repaired a couple times, and there were a few areas where several of the dark brown original bricks had been replaced with newer ones that were lighter in color. A rusty old door was built into the tower several stories up from the ground. At one point in time there was a staircase leading to it, but it was long gone.

Bailey had been captivated by the tower ever since he first saw it and often wondered what was up there or if there was any other way in, such as an underground tunnel. It reminded him of a prison guard tower, and he pondered if it had ever been used for nefarious purposes in the past.

Sam, who was standing next to him, seemed to read his mind.

“Do you ever think about what’s up there? I’m curious.” he said.

“Me too. If there was a way up I’d check it out.”

Bailey was a very curious person, and if there was still a path to the tower, he’d have gone up there a long time ago. It was probably just an empty hollow space, but he had a hunch there was far more to it than that. There was something unique about it, like the secrets of the past were still up there patiently waiting for him to discover them.

As much as he wanted to satisfy his curiosity, he knew the mystery of the watch tower was a case that would remain unsolved.


	2. The woman in red

Bailey’s energy for the day had been nearly depleted by the time second break rolled around. The new steam line was installed and secured, and now he was ready for a nap. Sleeping during break time was never guaranteed, especially when his co workers were jabbering away.

Sam stood by the entryway to their break area, consoling his young son over the phone.

“I know, buddy. It sucks. Work never quits. We’ll go fishing next weekend, okay? I promise.” he started cracking up at his son’s response and turned towards his boss. “Hey Pete, my son thinks you’re a stupid poopyface. No offense. His words, not mine.”

Pete chuckled in amusement. “None taken. I said that exact same thing to my old man when I was a kid. Children come up with the best insults. You can’t even be mad when they get you. It’s just too funny.”

“Tell me about it,” Eric added. “Last week my daughter was mad at me, so she looked me right in the eye and told me I was nothing but an old farter guy. I was like, ‘Come on Camilla, I look old to you? I’m only thirty one, that’s not old.”

“But you admit to being a farter guy?” Waylon asked.

“Damn straight. Why do you think I eat broccoli with my lunch every time you’re my tool partner?” Eric inquired with a smirk.

As amusing as their conversation was, Bailey tuned them out as he put his head down and shut his eyes. The hard plastic table made a terrible pillow, but the conversations around him grew quieter and he drifted off within minutes.

**********************

When Bailey opened his eyes, he was alone and the room was swaying. He sat up, but he was dizzy, excessively tired and felt like he was only half conscious.

The tilting slowly stopped, allowing him to focus on his surroundings. Everyone else was gone, but their stuff was still there. Fearing he’d slept far past the end of break, he got up and headed for the exit. Why hadn’t anyone woken him up? His limbs were numb and heavy, like the blood circulation had been cut off for too long. Standing up was an ordeal, but he managed to lumber towards the door.

“What the hell is wrong with me?” Bailey asked himself.

He got his answer when he looked to the left and saw a cluster of seven water coolers in the corner.

_That’s not right. I’m dreaming._

Once he realized this, the heaviness in his limbs went away and the mental fog lifted, leaving him feeling normal and alert.

Bailey crept out of the break area and looked around. The entire plant was dark and desolate, with the only source of illumination being the moonlight drifting in from the windows high above him.

He retrieved his phone from his pocket and used it as a flashlight as he ambled around. Despite being alone in the black lifeless building, he wasn’t afraid. He felt relaxed and at ease.

From the corner of his eye, he detected a slight red glow coming from the left. It was dim at first, but grew brighter and more intense as it moved towards him. A large crimson colored butterfly, glowing within a ball of bright red light, flitted past him. It left a trail of glitter behind as it flew, like it was beckoning Bailey to follow it.

Immediately transfixed, he followed without question. 

The glistening red path lead into the elevator, where the butterfly was perched on top of the recently polished button panel. All of the graffiti was gone, the elevator walls restored to their original brilliant white. The button for the tenth floor glimmered with soft red light, and Bailey pressed it out of curiosity.

Instead of creaking and jolting like it usually did, the elevator ascended in silence and offered a smooth, comforting ride. The doors slid open with a quiet ding and the butterfly coasted out. Bailey followed it to the right and saw his destination.

A door had appeared in what was previously only a bare, cracked cement wall. Hand crafted from mahogany and embroidered with an etching of jousting lions, it looked absurdly out of place, like it had been picked straight out of a police station in a noir film. Warm light radiated through the door's frosted glass panel, indicating that someone was in the room.

Bailey reached out and turned the highly textured bronze plated doorknob, wondering who--or what--was waiting for him inside.

The door opened to reveal an old office featuring a Victorian inspired design. The room was small yet cozy, with dark stained hardwood flooring and several wall mounted glass shade light fixtures. In the center of the room, a luxurious oak desk was placed perfectly upon a handwoven red and black Persian rug. The desk looked like it was well over a hundred years old and likely one of a kind. Though Bailey could only see its backside, he visualized each desk drawer having a keyhole set over a handle made of pure silver. A large, very expensive leather chair loomed over the desk’s surface, casting a long distorted shadow down the center of the room. It was turned towards the back wall, but Bailey sensed someone sitting in it. A slowly rotating two bladed fan hung from the ceiling, cooling the unseen person. Behind the chair, half a dozen antique bookshelves stood against the wall, each one crammed to the brink with withered leather bound books that probably hadn’t been opened in close to a century. Centered above them was a framed black and white photo of the power plant on its opening day in 1941. The room’s left wall was adorned by a series of seemingly unrelated paintings; a quaint cottage in the woods, a nude woman reclining on a loveseat, a whaling ship at sea. Three large windows, each one partially shrouded by embossed yellow curtains, took up most of the right wall. Beams of hypnotizing red light shone through them, casting the entire room in an otherworldly scarlet glow.

Bailey felt hesitant about entering the room, as whoever was sitting in the chair was waiting for him to approach. It was too late to leave, he’d announced his presence by opening the door. He took several small steps in, and the wood floor creaked loudly underneath his boots.

The chair turned to face him. 

Much to Bailey’s surprise, its occupant was a gorgeous woman, not the middle aged man he’d been expecting.

The pale raven haired beauty before him wore a sleek, shimmering red dress that showed just enough to be enticing while still leaving something to the imagination. Her smokey dark eyes, alluring and seductive, burned into Bailey’s blue ones. She offered him a smile that strayed towards the devious side, amplifying when her ruby red lips parted and a shiny golden tooth sparkled inside her mouth. She extended an exquisitely manicured finger and slowly beckoned Bailey to come closer.

He obeyed without question.

A light rain began to fall from the ceiling and several drops landed on his head, but he didn’t react as he couldn’t pry his eyes away from the woman in red.

The woman got up from her chair and the sound of her heels clicking against the floor echoed throughout the room as she slowly slunk towards him. Bailey was surprised at how tall she was. Standing at just over six feet, she was imposing and projected a strong aura of authority. The controlling power exhuming from her was something Bailey had never experienced before and he immediately realized that he wanted this woman to dominate him in every way. He wanted to be her slave, her personal toy to use however and whenever she wanted. That was his only desire, to be used and abused by this woman until she grew bored and threw him away.

He dropped to his knees and looked down at her feet in a sign of submission. The woman’s red shoes were finished with satin and had a petite bow over the toe. Bailey wanted to touch them but wasn’t sure if he should. The rain continued to fall, fat drops pattering down onto his head and soaking the top of his hat.

The woman didn’t speak, but Bailey heard her deep, sultry voice in his head.

_You belong to me, Bailey. You are mine forever. Now look at me._

Bailey looked up at her, obedient and willing. He would do anything for her.

_Let me touch you._

She looked down at him with unrestrained lust. Her smile grew malicious and her eyes glowed red as she lunged at Bailey and seized him by the neck with both hands.

Her crushing, unnaturally strong grip tightened and Bailey panicked as he began to choke and gasp for air. He tried to break free, but it was no use. Escaping her death grip proved impossible. His limbs refused to cooperate as the hands around his neck clenched even tighter, cutting off the oxygen flow.

The rain became a downpour, sending torrents of water down onto Bailey’s head and shoulders as the woman let go of his neck and took his head into her hands. She began to twist.

_You’re mine, Bailey. I’m never, ever going to let you go._

He felt her cold hands on his face, a split second of pain as his neck snapped with a dry crunch, then nothing.

Bailey’s eyes shot open and he awoke with a start.

Noah hovered above him. “Break’s over. You were really out, I tapped on your head like ten times before you finally woke up.” he commented and gave his friend one last prod for good measure.

“I didn’t think I was that tired,” Bailey said.

He didn’t mention the strange dream he had, as he was a bit unsettled by it. He couldn’t quite shake the ominous feeling that it left behind.

*******************

The crane operator took off shortly after two, so all work on the rooftop was suspended until Monday morning. The steam line was in and adequately supported, which was all that mattered to Pete. Despite the day’s rocky start, the installation went smoothly and there was one less monkey on his back. He partnered up the rest of his guys and tasked them with several small jobs located throughout the plant to finish up the day.

In the corner of the break area, he typed a response to the latest in a never ending stream of work related emails. He was lucky enough to have a desk, even if it was just an old cafeteria table with his laptop and papers sitting on it. It was the best he could do without a proper organization system. Unlike Jeremy’s side which was messy and strewn with half a dozen empty Coke cans, Pete kept his side nice and tidy.  
He was a very neat, organized person who liked things to be just so. He had a designated place for everything so it was rather ironic that he was married to a woman who arranged books by color as opposed to title.

Right as he sent the response to the latest email, his laptop chimed and another one popped up. Before he could even check it, his phone blew up with a series of notifications.

“For fuck’s sake, can’t this shit wait?” he groaned to himself.

While he enjoyed the nice foreman pay, he was tired of being constantly bombarded with work related calls and emails. He longed for the days when it was considered unacceptable to contact him outside of his normal work hours. Sometimes he got so many emails that he wanted to take a sledgehammer to his laptop and smash it into pieces. As annoying as it could be, he only had to deal with it for a couple more months. He had it all planned out in his head. On the day he retired, he’d throw that damn laptop straight into his wood chipper while smoking a celebratory cigar, then hop on a plane with his wife and fly to England.

Just three more months.

The email was an invite for the upcoming office party, which Pete couldn’t be any less interested in. He’d been with Highland Mechanical for thirty years, but he’d never attended the annual office party and wasn’t about to start now.

He checked his phone and groaned in annoyance upon realizing that he had three voicemails from Jason. He didn’t _want_ to talk to Jason. Wasn’t today’s safety meeting enough?

Oddly, his phone hadn’t rung. He listened to the first voicemail. It was only a couple seconds long and was comprised of mostly static with a few scratching sounds in the background. The next two were exactly the same, several seconds of scratchy static with no actual message to be heard. They had all been left within mere seconds of each other, which didn’t seem possible.

It didn’t make sense to him, but he was a tad illiterate about technology and for all he knew, he’d probably just changed the settings on his phone by accident.

As he messed with his settings, a fourth voicemail from Jason popped up.

Pete narrowed his eyes at the notification and his finger hovered over the screen, but he hesitated. Jason wasn’t known for being a prankster or even having a sense of humor, but in Pete’s mind, there couldn’t be a reason for the voicemails other than to annoy him.

“You know what? No. I don’t care.” he held down the phone’s power button and shut it off. “No one else is going to bother me today. Until Monday morning, I’m unreachable.”

Whatever Jason wanted, it could fucking _wait._

*******************************

Noah was blathering on about the basketball game he watched last night, but Jeremy was only half listening, instead leaning over the lockbox with his head in his hands. He felt terrible. The building’s temperature was only 60 degrees at most, but he felt hot and flushed, and the bloated, queasy feeling that had been lingering in his stomach for the past hour kept getting worse until he was in a lot of discomfort.

A moment later Noah finally noticed how one sided the conversation had become. “Did you fall asleep on me? I didn’t think my story was _that_ boring.”

“No, I was listening. I just don’t feel good. My stomach is killing me.” Jeremy replied.

Noah raised a brow and shot him a knowing look. “Did you eat that pizza crust that fell on the floor? I saw you eyeing it.”

“Yes,” Jeremy admitted sheepishly. “I wiped all the metal shavings off though, it should have been fine. Jay said so.”

Noah couldn’t help but laugh. “See, there’s your problem. You listened to Jay. I told you three times not to eat that crust, but you did it anyways. You’re like a naughty dog who can’t be trusted around food. Speaking of dogs, did Zoe have her puppies yet?”

“Oh, yeah!” Jeremy and his wife bred Labrador Retrievers, and his two year old yellow lab Zoe had recently had a litter of puppies. He was hit with sudden blow of cramping abdominal pain, but ignored it and reached for his phone so he could show off the puppy pictures. Zoe had given birth to seven adorable puppies, two were black and five were yellow like her.

“Aw, cute. Look at that one!” Noah fawned over a picture of a chubby yellow puppy that was playfully biting the ear of one of its litter mates.

“Do you want one? We’re going to give them up for adoption in a couple weeks.”

“Yeah, if I can convince my parents to go for it. We’ve already got two cats so I’ve got a feeling they’ll say no. But seriously, who could say no to that face?”

Within a minute it became apparent that neither of them were going to get any more work done, and Noah was getting increasingly giddy about the idea of possibly bringing home a puppy. While he liked his parent’s cats, one of them was a crotchety, cranky sourpuss older than he was and who probably didn’t have much time left. 

Noah wanted to see more cute puppy pictures, but Jeremy was hunched over the lockbox again so he left him alone. He could see more pictures on Monday.

Now bored, he craned his neck to look up at the blackness far above him. On any given day, one could stand in the center of the common area on the ground floor and see all the way up to the top of the building. The shadows concealing the ceiling seemed to reach down further than they normally did, like they were threatening to consume each floor one by one with a blackness so deep and invasive even the brightest light would simply be snuffed out.

For the first time, Noah noticed that the tenth floor was completely obscured within the shadows.

******************************

Cameron was in an irritable mood, and all of Jay’s efforts to cheer him up failed. Nothing he said or did could make the other man smile and he couldn’t figure out why. Usually he could at least get a slight titter out of his sullen colleague.

Jay didn’t like it when people were visibly upset. He was a real people pleaser and had a tendency to lift the spirits of everyone around him, but today all he got from Cameron were sighs, clipped one word answers and annoyed grunts. 

Of course they had to be partnered together. To Jay, the silence between them was becoming awkward, but to Cameron it was welcome and he couldn’t help but be irked every time it was broken. He didn’t know why he was so irritated, but he wasn’t feeling like himself. He was pissed off for no reason yet couldn’t pinpoint why. Ever since lunch he’d felt like someone else was trying to get inside his head.

Jay loitered a few yards away, mentally debating wether or not to remain quiet. He cracked seconds later and broke the silence once more.

“Got something on your mind, Cam?” he asked.

Cameron tensed up but ignored him and continued to pick half spent welding sticks out of his bag. In his mind, Jay had to be stupidest, most socially inept person on the planet.

“You seem upset. I just wanted to make you laugh, but I feel like I made you mad instead.” Jay said cluelessly. “If I did, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to-”

“Shut up Jay! For once in your life, shut the fuck up!” Cameron snarled, making Jay take a surprised step back. Even as he spoke, he didn’t know where the rage and hostility was coming from, but the venomous words came forth anyways. “Are you seriously that stupid? Has it ever occurred to you that maybe I just don’t fucking like you?”

Jay’s eyes widened and he briefly stammered before speaking. “You don’t like me?” Crushing devastation spread over his usually pleasant features. “I was just trying to be friendly...”

“Go fuck yourself.” Cameron spat with toxicity.

As soon as the words left his mouth, whatever was plaguing his mind vanished and all his anger instantly faded. He was himself again. He hadn’t meant or wanted to yell at Jay but the damage was done. There was no going back, and he couldn’t explain his actions.

“You’re a real asshole, you know that?” Jay’s voice was cold but the notes of hurt were there clear as day.

“Jay, I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean that. I don’t hate you and I don’t know where that came from. A weird feeling just came over me. It’s like someone else was-” Cameron cut himself off when he realized Jay was walking away and heading down the stairs. “Where are you going?”

“I’m going to lube up and go fuck myself.” Jay shot back at him as he disappeared down the stairs. 

“Jay, wait! I can explain!” Cameron called after him.

Could he? Now he wasn’t so sure. His head was clear again, but he didn’t have the faintest idea what caused his angry outburst in the first place.

He paused by the railing and listened as Jay’s footsteps faded into silence.

“Good job Cameron.” he said to himself. “You ruined it, like always. This is why you don’t have many friends.”

*******************************

“Son of a bitch!” Eric cursed.

“What happened?” Sam looked over at him. They were replacing a small steam line blind on the fifth floor.

“I dropped my nut driver. It fell through the grating.”

“Did you see where it went?”

“No. It could be anywhere down there. I’ve got to find it, my grandfather gave it to me.”

They descended to the fourth floor to look. 

“It probably fell somewhere over there.” Eric pointed to the dark corner behind a decommissioned dust covered motor. He clicked on his hardhat mounted flashlight and slunk into the blackness with no fear.

Sam hung back. He couldn’t put his finger on why, but he didn’t want to follow Eric. Normally he wasn’t afraid of the dark, but the shadows that slithered out from behind the motor were unnaturally black, like they would swallow him up if they passed over him.

The entire floor had an unsettling feel to it. Weak blades of sunlight drifted in through the dirty glass windows on the other side of the wall. A couple of them had been covered up with plywood and some of the panes had expressive faces spray painted on them that cast exaggerated shadows on the floor.

A nearby long empty holding tank caught his attention. On its surface someone long ago had hastily scrawled a phrase repeatedly. 

_Hey Daryl....._

_Jeff is looking for you  
Jeff is looking for you  
Jeff is looking for you  
Jeff is looking for you  
Jeff is looking for you  
Jeff is looking for you_

Sam suddenly felt alone. He couldn’t see or hear Eric anymore. Was he gone? Had the shadows engulfed him? He pictured them stretching out and spreading in all directions, swallowing up everything they touched while he backed up out of their grasp. He imagined the shadows forming into wispy black tendrils, wrapping around his ankle and pulling him deep into the darkness, where he would be--

“Found it!” Eric stepped out of the shadows, smiling and holding his vintage nut driver. 

Sam was relieved, but he instantly felt stupid for getting so worked up about the shadows. Eric was fine. Of course he was.

“I don’t know about you, but I’m ready to get the hell out of here. Go home, have dinner, crack a beer with my wife and go to bed.” Eric said.

Sam couldn’t agree more, though he was eager to leave for a different reason. The place was really starting to get to him.

*********************************

When there was work to be done, Waylon was all business. Slacking off wasn’t an option and he didn’t have the patience to work with lazy people. Once the task was done, his playful goofy side came out. Teasing his tool partners never got old, but he always kept it lighthearted to avoid making anyone angry.

Armed with a one inch bolt, Waylon crept around the corner and eyed his target. Terry was bent over, putting the Sawzall he’d been using back on its shelf. Waylon was confident he could make the shot, but he had to act fast.

He hurled the bolt with articulate precision, hitting Terry right in the ass and making him leap upright with a surprised yelp.

“You fucker! How’d you hit me from way over there?”

“Come on, Terry! The worst pitcher in the history of baseball could hit that fat ass of yours!” Waylon cackled. He was one of Terry’s closest friends and knew exactly how much he could tease him without going too far. 

“Oh it is _on_." Terry threatened his friend, then grabbed a nearby nylon D ring and cracked it like a whip for emphasis.

“You’ve got to catch me first!” Waylon sassed and darted away. 

He sprinted around the basement’s old pump house and hid behind it. After a few seconds, he peeked out from behind it and scanned the location of his pursuer. Terry hadn’t made much progress. He hadn’t seen where Waylon went and was clearly just guessing. Thirty seconds later, he changed his course and sniffed around several yards from where Waylon was hiding.

A dull creak sounded from somewhere deep within the basement, drawing Terry’s attention and allowing Waylon to stealthily sneak away. He crouched down behind a cart stacked with sections of pipe. There was a row of four decrepit coal burning furnaces several yards in front of him, each one with round, very heavy cast iron door.

Out of the corner of his eye, Waylon saw Terry silently and gracefully bound behind the rightmost furnace. He disappeared into the shadows, but part of his silhouette was projected on the wall.

Smiling to himself, Waylon picked up another rusty bolt from the floor and advanced upon his prey.

“I’ve got you now...” he whispered to himself.

He was about ten feet away from the furnace when he sensed something behind him.

A long, thin object smacked painfully against his ass, causing him to jump and cry out in surprise.

“Payback!” Terry announced gleefully. The D ring hung from his right hand.

Waylon blinked and stared at him in confusion.

“How the hell did you get behind me so fast?”

“What do you mean?” Terry asked. “You walked right into the open. I followed you.”

“You went behind that furnace.”

“No I didn’t.”

“Yeah you did, I saw you.” 

“What are you talking about?” 

“I saw-” Waylon pointed to the furnace and his words died in his mouth.

The silhouette was still there. It shifted and retreated further, slipping out of sight. Someone was back there. Waylon wasn’t about to admit it, but he didn’t feel brave enough to check it out, even though it was probably just a trick of the light combined with his own expansive imagination.

“I mean, I could have sworn I saw you run back there...”

Terry shrugged. “It was probably just my evil twin brother Tommy. I wouldn’t worry about it.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right.” Waylon played it cool, brushed it off and followed Terry towards the stairs.

As he left, he cast a quick glance over his shoulder at the furnaces. Nothing out of the ordinary. His logical side told him it was only a figment of his imagination, but the small shard of him that believed the existence of the paranormal nagged at him.

_There was something behind that furnace and you know it._

*********************************

What awaited him at the top of the stairs?

After finishing his work for the day, Bailey had mumbled something about leaving his folding rule on the roof and needing to go fetch it. It was a harmless white lie, in reality he had to check the tenth floor for the door from his dream. He had to make sure it wasn’t there.

He hadn’t mentioned his dream to Noah when he woke up, but he couldn’t push it out of his head. Everything in it down to the most minute detail had seemed so real, and that was the part that unnerved him. It was as if the door had been there the whole time but was invisible to the human eye.

 _This is ridiculous,_ Bailey thought to himself as he trudged up the steps. _There’s no fucking door up there. How could there be? This is a waste of my time._

And yet, he couldn’t put his thoughts to rest until he could physically confirm its absence.

He hesitated as he approached the final flight of steps. He ascended them slowly, and when he neared the top, he was finally able to stop obsessing over it.

There was no door. The wall before him was the same bare concrete wall it had always been, no trace of a door or anything unusual.

_What did you expect, Bailey? It was a dream. Nothing more. You’ve watched too many scary movies._

He laughed to himself. He’d walked up eleven flights of stairs and worn himself out just to confirm the obvious fact that there was no such thing as the supernatural or doors that defied the laws of space and time.

That was what he told himself, and he believed it.

He was wrong.


	3. I see you

When Sam reached Callahan’s exit gate at 4:39pm, the sun was just starting to set. He was first in the line of cars approaching the gate. The dreary, isolated atmosphere of the plant had really gotten to him. It never bothered him before, but today he sensed that something was amiss.

No one else had noticed the quietly menacing atmosphere. Unlike Sam, Eric never felt it. He was upbeat and content all day, cracking jokes and giving people shit. When he’d ventured into the deep plethora of blackness to find his nut driver, he’d been relaxed and unafraid. Sam didn’t believe in ghosts, but when he’d watched Eric slink into the shadows, he’d felt a clenching dread in his chest, like he expected something bad to happen to him. His instinct shouted at him to stay in the light, that Eric had made a foolish decision that would cost him his sanity or even his life. His fear had been pointless because less than two minutes later Eric had emerged unharmed from the black depths, smiling and laughing like always.

It took some effort, but now that he was about to go home, Sam convinced himself that he overreacted. Ghosts weren’t real, and he’d always laughed at those ghost hunter shows and people who swore they could communicate with their dead grandmother through a Ouija board. He’d had a long week, he was tired and his mind was playing tricks on him. There was nothing lurking within the shadows and Eric was never in danger. The plant was old and had a creepy feel, but it was harmless.

Sam felt better about it now and even chastised himself for getting so worked up about it. _Really, Sam? Forty two years old and you’re afraid of some dark shadows? Your five year old son is braver than you are, you big pussy._

He flashed his ID card to the reader posted by the gate. It didn’t open. He tried again, but to no effect. Cursing to himself, he tried a third time and was denied once more. He stepped out of his truck and mashed the numerical keypad buttons on the reader to no avail. Awesome. He’d killed two machines in one day just by touching them. That was a new record.

“What’s the hold up?” Pete called out from his car.

“The gate won’t open,” Sam called back. “My card must be bad or something.”

“Try mine.” Pete got out and strode up to the card reader, but he too was rejected. “Great,” he said sarcastically. “The system must be down.”

Jay and Terry got out of their vehicles, everyone else following suit behind them.

“The gate’s broken?” Terry asked the obvious.

“Oh, I have an idea!” Jay piped up enthusiastically. Gripping his card with his left hand, he reached through the bars towards the reader on the other side of the gate. It was a tight fit, but he was able to maneuver his lanky arm through the bars.

“Almost there. Almost....” he smashed himself against the gate. He looked ridiculous, but his card was a mere inch from the reader. “So close! Terry, push me.”

“Jay, that’s not going to work.” Terry responded.

“Just try. Push me a bit and I’ll have it.”

Terry gave him a light shove and it did the trick.

“Got it!” Jay exclaimed triumphantly. “Victory is mine!” He tapped his card to the reader, but nothing happened. No matter how many times he tried, the gate remained shut.

“It’s not going to work,” Sam said.

Jay made one last attempt, then his card tumbled out of his fingers and clattered to the ground. He crouched down and reached for it, but it was over a foot from his grasp. He couldn’t reach it. Defeated, he gave up. “Well. This sucks.”

“Don’t beat yourself up. You tried.” Pete said. “I can’t believe this. Is it Friday the 13th or something? Because this day has really been punching me in the balls.”

Jay laughed, but stopped and composed himself when no one else joined in. “Sorry. You’re right, not funny. Now what?”

“I’ll talk to the security guards and see if they can get someone out here to fix the system. In the meantime, we hang out and wait.” Pete explained.

Everyone else bitched and whined while they moved back towards the building.

Sam followed slowly. He glanced from the broken card reader to the watch tower, a skyscraper of black against the pinkish orange glow of the setting sun. As he walked back towards the plant he felt it again, stronger this time. That tight, clenching fear.

*********************************

The security room was located in the northeast corner of the first floor, right next to the general offices. The two guards, Mark and Corey, were both slacking on the job. Pete thought they looked straight out of a 80’s buddy cop movie. Mark would be the hopeless overweight white cop while Corey would be his witty black partner who delivered a snarky one liner after every action sequence. In reality they’d both flunked out of police academy in the first week.

“Hey guys. You got a minute?” Pete asked as he stepped into their office.

“Is there a problem?” Mark was eating Cheetos and his fingers were stained orange.

“Yeah, there’s a problem. The card reader system is down. We can’t leave.”

“Really?” Corey looked up from his ipad. He was playing Minecraft. “Everything looks fine from here.”

“Well it’s not. We’re locked in. I’ve had a long day, and right now, the only thing I want is to go home.” Pete’s patience with the guards was already wearing thin.

“Alright, I’ll have Vol-Tech send a technician out. I’ve got to warn you though, it’s five o clock on a Friday, don’t expect speedy service unless it’s an emergency.” Corey said.

Pete glared at him with a deadpan expression. “I think this counts as an emergency, Corey.”

“Hmm. Yeah, I guess it does.” Mark added. 

Once Corey made the call, Pete left. He didn’t want to engage those two buffoons any more than he had to. He stopped at a vending machine, got himself a bag of sour cream and onion chips and started walking back to the break area when his attention was drawn to a set of basement access stairs near the offices.

The white block walls surrounding the stairs were bathed in the yellowish light of old sodium fixtures. A large pipe wrench laid abandoned on the landing below.

Figuring it could be one of his, Pete descended to the landing and picked up the wrench. It was stenciled with words Galvin Electric. 

“Lazy bastards,” he muttered to himself and turned to walk back up the stairs.

***********************************

A hint of unease, woven with a note of something oddly foreign, hung in the air. Bailey studied his colleagues carefully. Sam was nervous and apprehensive, like he was sensing the same thing Bailey was. Waylon was tense and focused, staring at his phone, but Bailey could see that he wasn’t actually reading the words on his screen. Jay, who normally couldn’t be quiet for more than five minutes, hadn’t uttered a single word since losing his ID card. Cameron was visibly uncomfortable. He looked at Jay sheepishly, then quickly averted his gaze as if scorned. Nobody was talking.

Pete strode back into the room. He was in a foul mood.

“What’s the verdict?” Eric asked.

“Those two clowns in the office kept telling me everything was working fine, but they wouldn’t know their ass from a hole in the ground. I convinced them to call Vol-Tech out here. It might be another hour.” Pete explained. He pulled out his phone, immersed himself in a game and silence took over again.

Bailey looked from face to face. Pete, Noah, Eric and Terry were acting normally but everyone else seemed upset or on edge and Bailey knew why. Like him, they felt _it_ without actually knowing what _it_ was. He wanted to talk to somebody, but he didn’t want to bother Jay or Cameron and Noah was busy eating leftover pizza. Bailey knew better than to disrupt him when he was eating.

He looked over at Jeremy, who was slumped forward on the table. He was resting his head on one arm and looked pale.

Bailey poked him. “Hey, wake up.” he whispered.

Jeremy groaned and curled into himself. He hadn’t felt good since lunch, but now unrelenting waves of nausea washed over him every couple of minutes. He felt horrendously sick, but his limbs were like anchors and he didn’t have much energy. An even stronger peak of nausea rolled through his stomach and he sat up, wavering with dizziness as he did so. 

Bailey looked over at him. “Are you okay? You don’t look so good.” he commented.

Jeremy didn’t respond. Opening his mouth would likely be a poor idea. Directly in front of him, Noah was voraciously chomping down on a leftover slice of Hawaiian pizza, greasy strings of cheese melding the slimy cubes of pineapple together. That repulsive yet harmless sight finally tipped Jeremy over the edge. His stomach lurched and he briskly left the room with his hand over his mouth.

He wouldn’t have to go far, as there was a bathroom fairly close to the break area. As a rule, the indoor bathrooms were for the plant employees only. Contractors weren’t supposed to use them and would get scolded if they were caught doing so, but Jeremy assumed that rule went straight out the window in the case of emergencies. If he got chewed out for it on Monday morning, so be it.

He didn’t get much further than the bathroom doorway before erupting. Despite his best efforts he couldn’t hold it back anymore and puked all over the floor by the sinks. He clamped his hand over his mouth again, then staggered over to the closest stall, where he dropped to his knees and vomited profusely into the toilet. 

It didn’t make him feel any better. Even after he threw up all the pizza, as well as everything else he ate in the past 24 hours, he still felt nauseous, his stomach cramped painfully, his head was pounding and he was sweating. With a moan, he let his head fall onto the toilet seat. He felt far too lousy to care about germs. He likely wouldn’t be going anywhere for a while and wished that someone would get him a glass of water.

His wish was granted as the bathroom door swung open and someone strode in. Light footsteps echoed throughout the room.

From his position on the floor, Jeremy could see two black dress shoes and the cuff of a pair of straight leg black slacks. He stared, slightly confused. It wasn’t any of his colleagues or either of the guards, leaving him mystified. As far as he was aware, nobody else was in the building.

The man, whoever he was, took a few steps forward. He stopped in front of the puke on the floor and crouched down, like he was inspecting it. A hand, part of a nice suit and the bottom of a black satin tie came into view, but the man’s face remained hidden by the stall divider.

 _You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,_ Jeremy thought to himself. His upper lip curled in disgust when he realized what the strange man was doing. _What the hell is wrong with this guy?_

A long whiplike tongue snaked down and lapped at the repulsive pool on the floor. 

“What the fuck?!” Jeremy shouted in revolted surprise. 

The tongue went rigid for a second, then retracted. The man, or whatever it was, slowly got up and slunk towards the stall divider. It stood still for a moment, then crouched down on the floor once more and looked underneath the gap, revealing its horrific face.

Jeremy flattened himself against the stall wall in terror. He’d been discovered, now this _thing_ was sliding underneath the divider, creeping closer to him.

“Get away! Fuck off!” Jeremy lashed out and landed a hard kick right to the thing’s face. He felt a crunch and hoped that he’d hurt it. He kicked it again, and it strangely didn’t fight back.

A chorus of wet squelches and fibrous tears sounded throughout the room as its face began to change. The monstrous being reached for him with a hand that was disturbingly human.

Jeremy was seized by paralyzing terror. The sight before him was that of the worst nightmare. Something that wasn’t of this world, something that should not be. He tried to back away from it, but he had nowhere to go. The thing spoke his name.

“Jeremy?”

“Get away from me!” he didn’t want to touch the awful creature, but he struck at its hand in a panic, praying that it would go away. It was right in front of him now.

“Hey, calm down! It’s just me.” the voice came from his right now.

Maniacally, Jeremy whipped his head over towards the voice. 

Waylon was standing in front of him, holding a glass of water.

Jeremy frantically looked back at the divider. The monster was gone.

“You saw that, right? Tell me you saw that!” he shouted in a panicked fluster.

“Saw what?” Waylon questioned. 

“That guy. That..that thing! It was right there!” Jeremy pointed at the gap under the divider. “I swear, it was right there! I’m serious, Waylon! I saw it, and....and....you don’t believe me, do you?” the panic left his voice and now he sounded tired and worn out, disappointed that his claim wasn’t believed.

Waylon crouched down and reached towards him. Jeremy flinched away from his hand.

“Easy,” Waylon said in a gentle voice. He plucked Jeremy’s green welding cap off his head and felt his forehead. “Jesus buttfucking Christ, you’re burning up. You’ve got one hell of a fever, well over a hundred I’d say. No wonder you’re puking and seeing things. Here. Drink this.”

“It’s not going to stay down.” Jeremy protested. 

“Doesn’t matter. Drink it, you’ll get dehydrated otherwise.” Waylon instructed.

Jeremy drank the water. It felt incredible traveling down his irritated throat, and it was thankfully staying down for the time being. He set the empty glass on the floor. 

“I really don’t feel good,” he said. “Can we go home yet?”

“No,” Waylon sighed. “The technicians aren’t even here. I don’t know what’s taking so long. We’ll just to have to wait. Are you going to be okay?”

“I guess,” Jeremy replied. “But I saw something. At least, I thought I did. It felt so real. I heard it, felt that thing’s nose crunch when I kicked it. I _felt_ it.”

Waylon paused and the basement scene came back to him. _Tell him, Waylon. Tell him what you saw behind that furnace._

“Trust me, that wasn’t real.” he assured. 

Waylon could tell that Jeremy clearly didn’t believe him, but he didn’t want to say, ‘I believe you, I saw a ghost in the basement earlier’ and freak him out even more. 

“Now, unless you’re planning on spending the night in here, you should get yourself cleaned up and come back to the break room. The gate will be fixed before you know it.”

“Okay. I don’t want to be alone anyways,” Jeremy admitted.

“You’re crazy if you think I’m going to leave you alone. You good now?” Waylon asked.

Jeremy nodded and hoisted himself off the floor. He blundered over to the sinks, rinsed his mouth and cleaned himself off. As he left, he took a last lingering glance at where he was certain an otherworldly horror had been only minutes before.


	4. Jobsite Fatality

Every nine seconds, Cameron’s boots clomped over a loose piece of plywood as he relentlessly paced back and forth. 

Noah glared at him. “Will you stop that?”

“No can do. I get anxious when I’m stressed. And I’m very stressed, Noah. Those technicians should have been here by now.” Cameron responded.

“Can you at least stop walking on the board then? It’s annoying.” Noah asked in an irritated tone.

Cameron didn’t stop pacing, but he was courteous enough to alter his path. Sam watched him, fingers nervously tapping on the railing he was leaning against. Bailey wordlessly observed both of them. Their combined distress made his own anxiety go up. He noticed Pete silently slink away from the group and disappear down the nearby staircase as Sam and Cameron intently tracked his movement.

Something wasn’t right. All three of them sensed it, but nobody wanted to be the first to say it in fear of being dismissed and ridiculed by the others.

Most of the group had migrated outside the break area, mainly to keep an eye on Jeremy, who was slumped against the wall. After he’d puked on the floor for the second time in twenty minutes and was shown to have a 106.3 degree fever, it became astoundingly clear that he wasn’t in any condition to drive himself home.

“I don’t know what made me so fucking sick,” he moaned. “I felt fine this morning, and-- shit that’s cold!” he jumped at the sudden frigid sensation. Terry, who had no medical knowledge what so ever, tried to help Jeremy by soaking his hat in ice water and putting in back on his head while Jay assisted by dumping ice cubes on him.

Waylon rolled his eyes at them. “You morons, you’re just going to make it worse.” he gently nudged them away and gave Jeremy a bottle of Ibuprofen. “Take a couple of these. Chew them, don’t swallow them.”

Jeremy obeyed and grimaced at the bitter taste. “Thanks. I don’t...I don’t think I’ll be able to drive myself home,” he looked completely out of it, like he was about to pass out.

“No shit,” Waylon chortled.

“I can give him a ride,” Terry offered. “It’s on the way, it’ll be no problem.”

“Wait!” Jeremy suddenly sat up straight. “What about my truck? I don’t want to leave it. If I leave it here he’ll steal it!”

“Who’s going to steal your truck, Jeremy?” Jay questioned.

“The guy from the bathroom,” Jeremy muttered. “The one with three eyes.”

Jay and Terry exchanged puzzled glances.

“What the hell is he talking about?”

“The purple one in the center is his true eye, but you can’t see it unless he reveals it. I saw it. He showed me and I couldn’t look away.”

Waylon gave a slight frown. “Change of plans. This is serious, you’re going to the hospital.” 

“I don’t want to,” Jeremy argued.

“ _Yes,_ Jeremy. You’re delirious.” Waylon looked around and noticed the group was one member short. “Where’s Pete?”

“I saw him go into the basement a minute ago,” Eric spoke up.

“The basement? Why?”

“He’s probably worried we didn’t get enough done today. I’ll go get him.” Eric said and walked down the steps to retrieve his foreman.

The basement was still. No movements, no sounds. It dawned on Eric that he could no longer hear his colleagues talking even though they were right above him. He scanned their hub, but all the shelves and lock boxes were shut tight. The lights in the basement seemed slightly dimmer than they were earlier. Sparsely placed sodium lamps cast pale cones of yellow light, giving some areas a warm contrast while leaving others in the darkness. Hadn’t they been brighter before?

Pete was no where in sight. Eric suddenly felt incredibly lonely and for a split second he thought he was completely alone, the only living thing in the building. He half expected to return to a empty, deserted break area, everyone else having left him behind to rot in the dark. But that wasn’t feasible. Pete was down here with him and the others were waiting for him upstairs. 

_Were they?_

“Pete? You down here?” Eric called out. 

The mechanical whirring of a handheld grinder started up from the nearby electrician’s hub area.

“What are you doing? Work’s over, there’s no need to-” Eric cut himself off as the sound abruptly changed. 

It became wet and organic, like Pete had taken the grinder to a slab of raw meat.

A pang of fear struck and spread through Eric's limbs, making them wobbly and jelly like. The grisly sound of the metal wheel sloughing at something wet and soft met his ears. His gut instinct told him to turn and run, but instead he nervously tried to swallow his fear and cautiously approached Pete from behind.

“Pete...what are you....” his voice wavered and trailed off as he registered the sight in front of him.

Pete was standing in front of a workbench, twitching as he firmly held the grinder to his face. His blood drenched glasses laid destroyed on the workbench.

Eric stared wide eyed and a jolt of pure adrenaline shot up his spine. He wanted to run away, but his knees locked up and all he could do was stand there in terror.

The grinding stopped and Pete slowly turned around to show off his ghoulish new face.

“Jesus fucking Christ!” Eric howled and cringed away. “S-stay back!”

The skin on the right side of Pete’s face had been ground away, revealing the slimy red muscles and tendons underneath. A few teeth and patches of white bone were visible where the grinder had worked deep. His right eye was nothing but a gaping dark hole. A hideous, twisted smile spread out on his horrific face.

“Can you feel it spreading, Eric?” he asked.

Eric raised his trembling hands. “Put that down, okay? Put it down. I’ll...I’ll go get help.”

Pete grinned at Eric fiendishly. “No, no. That won’t do. You can’t get in looking like _that.”_

Eric backed up until he bumped against a shelf. “What are you talking about?”

“I shed my old skin and embraced my true self. You wear a false face, Eric.” Pete rambled. “But that’s okay. Show your real face and you can join me. Let me help you.”

Pete raised his weapon and lunged at Eric. He lashed out, swinging the grinder in a wide arc and gouging Eric’s left arm before he could get out of the way.

“Ah, shit!” Eric hissed and instinctively gripped the wound. He whipped around and landed a hard punch to the intact side of Pete’s face, but it had no effect. Pete tackled him to the ground and used his bulk to pin him down.

“Don’t resist. The pain is only temporary. Soon you can join me,” Pete said almost soothingly as he held the grinder mere inches from Eric’s face.

Eric used one arm to try and keep Pete at bay while the other blindly searched for a weapon, but his brain shorted out and he succumbed to absolute panic.

“Help! Someone help me!” he hollered. He tussled with Pete in a futile effort to keep the grinder away from his face, but he was losing the battle. The strength in his arms ebbed away and the spinning metal disc was so close he could feel the breeze coming off it. He was done.

“Pete, stop!” Terry’s voice rang out as he sprinted towards the commotion. Everyone else came running after him.

“Hey, I said--” Terry froze in horror when he saw Pete’s ruined face.

“Holy shit! What happened to his face?!” Jay cried out.

Eric thrashed madly, but he couldn’t escape Pete’s grip.

“Please! Help me!” he pleaded.

Pete was outnumbered eight to one, but he wasn’t bothered. None of them had the courage to attack, they all stood around him in stunned shock, unable to do anything but gape in horror. Sam, Noah, Cameron, Jay and Jeremy were all uselessly cowering away from Pete, Terry was frozen in place and Waylon defensively brandished a length of strut but was too scared to use it.

A calm, serene expression washed over Pete’s face as he addressed the group.

“Give up and let it take over. You can’t fight it. One by one you’ll join me and together we will serve Her. Accept it.”

“Hey Pete, over here!” 

Pete turned just in time to see Bailey charging at him, a handheld conduit reamer clenched in his fist.

The grinder in Pete’s hand went flying as the sharp metal end of the cone shaped reamer pierced his right eye socket. Blood cascaded down his face. He swayed for a moment, the reamer stuck in his head, then he toppled forwards onto Eric.

“Get him off me!” Eric shouted. He pushed Pete’s lifeless body off him and rolled onto his side.

Bailey took a few small steps back, horrified at what he’d done.

“I just killed Pete,” he said in a tiny voice.

****************************************

“I can’t get through! It’s like someone is jamming the signal,” Mark said in exasperation.

“Try again then! We need to get the cops out here!” Terry barked at him. He’d tried calling the cops five times, only to get disconnected on the first ring. His phone was fully charged with excellent reception, but it had somehow been blocked from making calls.

“There’s a landline in our office, I’ll try that.” Corey suggested.

The twenty minutes following Pete’s death had been incredibly hectic. Save for the wound on his arm, Eric was alright physically but was understandably shaken up from his close call with death. Nobody knew what to say or why Pete attacked Eric, so they wrapped his corpse up in a long section of welding blanket and lugged him up the stairs.

Bailey hadn’t said much since the attack. He solemnly stared at the body on the floor. What had been a living, breathing person less than half an hour ago was now just a fleshy sack full of blood and organs. Bailey had killed plenty of pheasants, ducks and deer, but he never thought he’d add a human to the list, even if it was self defense. Killing a person was different, surreal and macabre. He understood what he’d done, but the reality of the situation hadn’t truly settled in yet.

The reamer was still lodged in Pete’s head, poking out from the wrapping. Bailey couldn’t stop looking at it. He was now officially a murderer. _Pete’s dead,_ he thought somberly. _He’s dead because I killed him. But I had to. It was self defense. If I hadn’t killed him, he would’ve murdered Eric. He could have killed me next. That doesn’t make me a bad person. I can still come back from this, right?_

Bailey wanted to think he could, but deep down he knew he’d never be the same.

“Hey.” Eric stepped in front of him and gently gripped his wrists. “Don’t look at him, look at me. You won’t go to prison for this. You saved my life, Bailey. I mean it. You saved my life. I thought I was a goner. I...I thought I was never going to see my wife or my daughter again. But I will. I’m going home tonight and I have you to thank for it.” he said sincerely. 

“Yeah, you’re braver than me, Bailey.” Noah spoke up with a nervous laugh. “Me? I’m a fucking pussy. I just stood there. I wanted to help, but I couldn’t.”

Bailey nodded and gave them a minuscule smile. “Okay.” He wasn’t feeling up for a conversation yet. He continued to stare at the corpse.

********************

Waylon lead Jeremy to the corner of their break room. He looked over his shoulder and when he was certain no one else was in earshot, he addressed his ailing colleague.

“Jeremy, listen to me. I lied to you earlier.” he admitted.

“About what?” Jeremy asked, confused.

“You said you saw a guy in the bathroom. One with too many eyes.”

“Yeah. He had three eyes. Stared at me."

“I believe you.”

“Really? You told me it wasn’t real.”

“I lied. It was real. Can you keep a secret?”

Jeremy nodded.

“I didn’t mention it before because I didn’t want to freak you out, but I saw something in the basement earlier. It looked just like Terry, but it wasn’t him. The real Terry was right behind me when I saw that... thing. I felt like it was trying to lure me to it. If Terry hadn’t snuck up on me I would’ve followed that thing.” Waylon explained. “Who knows what would have happened to me?”

“You could have ended up like Pete.” Jeremy guessed.

“Yeah. Something really weird is going on. The technicians never showed up, Pete went crazy and tried to kill Eric, and now our phones aren’t working. I don’t like this, Jeremy. I don’t like it at all. Keep your guard up, I don’t think we’re alone.”

They rejoined the main group, where Mark was berating Jay about the jammed phone signal. 

“How stupid are you? Someone’s jamming the signal. What about that do you not understand?” he asked.

“We’re pipefitters, not terrorists. What would anyone want to jam our signals for?” Jay questioned.

“Maybe Pete did it,” Terry offered. “I mean...the guy ground his own face off, he might have blocked the phone signal too. What other explanation could there be?”

“Oh, I can think of one,” Sam said. 

Corey came back looking perplexed. “The landline’s jammed too. Whoever did this is really good.”

“So we have no working phones? How are we going to get the police?” Noah asked.

“We’ll force the gate open, drive to the nearest phone and drop Jeremy off at the hospital.” Eric spoke up. “I don’t want to spend one more minute in this place.”

“Good idea,” Cameron agreed. “We can bust the gate open or climb the fence.”

The group talked it over for a minute before deciding to go with Eric’s idea.

“Alright. We’ll stay here with the body and wait for the police to arrive, then we’ll meet you down by the gate when you get back.” Corey said.

“If you can’t get the gate open, come back up here and we’ll figure something out.” Mark added as the rest of the guys walked out the door.

Night had fallen by the time they got outside, but no stars were visible in the pitch black sky and the surrounding woods were devoid of life. There were no squirrel chitters, bird songs or frog croaks. Only silence.

“I can’t hear any animals,” Bailey said uneasily. “When I leave I can _always_ hear them.”

“Yeah...something’s not right. I don’t like it.” Sam replied. His gaze swept over the empty courtyard, scanning for unseen threats.

“What the....” Terry trailed off and came to a stop as he approached the gate. The lamp post hanging over it cast down a beam of white light, illuminating a tall red humanoid shaped object.

Someone was standing on the other side of the gate.


	5. Arrival

An androgynous figure shrouded in a red robe stood motionlessly just beyond the entry gate. Its floor length satin garment reflected the light shining upon it, and it was loose fitting enough that none of the men staring at it could tell if the figure was a man or a woman. Every inch of the figure was covered, leaving no skin exposed. They wore black leather gloves and black boots, but the most striking part of the outfit was the goat skull they wore as a mask. It was affixed over a tight red stocking like garment that was fitted over their head.

The guys stared at the strange figure suspiciously. Its arrival couldn’t be a coincidence.

“Who are you and what are you doing?” Cameron stepped up to the gate and addressed them. 

The robe clad person did not speak.

“Hey asshole, I’m talking to you!” Cameron said angrily and jabbed a finger towards them. “I don’t know what your deal is, but I’m not in the mood for jokes. We’ve got a dead guy in there and no working phones, so unless you’re going to open this gate for us, fuck off so we can get help.”

A gleam in the dark caught Bailey’s attention and his eyes trailed the figure’s arm, down to the long black blade clutched in their right hand.

“This isn’t a joke, Cameron. He’s got a knife.”

Cameron leaped several feet back when he saw it. The freshly sharpened obsidian blade was eight inches long and had a tip that curved upwards.

The figure slowly held the knife up to face level and made a swift slicing motion across their neck with their left hand. On cue, a dozen more robed figures silently emerged from the darkness. They were all carrying knives and wearing identical skull adorned robes.

“Who are these people?” Noah looked around frantically. 

Additional figures manifested outside of the fence, coming from every direction. There were at least a hundred of them, and they all turned to stare at the guys simultaneously. They moved as one, mirroring the figure in front of the gate.

The dire reality of the situation finally sank in. They were locked in, cut off from the outside world and completely surrounded by people who had no intention of letting them pass by. Panic set in as they realized their lives might be in danger. They were severely outnumbered, and if the knife wielding figures wanted to get in, they would.

“What is this? Just let us go!” Jay tried to bargain with the figures, but his pleas fell on deaf ears.

All of the figures raised their knives at the same time.

“I think we should go back inside,” Bailey said hastily.

He was halfway up the stairs leading back into the building when a gunshot rang out from within, startling him. Several more shots were fired in quick succession, but stopped almost as abruptly as they’d started.

“That’s Mark and Corey. Something’s happening in there!” Waylon said.

“Think some of those creeps got in the building?” Bailey asked him.

“Maybe. I’m not going back in there. Not after what happened.” Eric said firmly.

“We’ve got to do something! We can’t just leave them!” Bailey persisted.

He peeked in through the small window on the door. At first glance everything was quiet with no sign of a disturbance or anything unusual. He nudged the door open and looked around cautiously. The coast was clear and the plant’s interior was still decently lit, but right away he saw what was wrong. A long unnaturally black shadow stretched across the floor back by their break area, and he was certain it hadn’t been there before.

“I see something on the floor back there,” he informed.

“What is it?” Sam asked.

“I don’t know, I’ll have to get closer.”

Bailey slipped in and took a deep breath to try and calm his nerves. He spied a hammer drill equipped with a twelve inch bit nearby and swiped it for protection just in case Mark or Corey attacked him.

“Paranormal investigator Bailey Cooper is about to go check out the spooky dark shadow,” it dawned on Bailey that he was talking just to try and drown out his growing apprehension. He took a couple small steps forward but no one else joined him. His colleagues hadn’t even come inside. Instead they were congregated just outside the door, preferring to watch him through the small window.

“Guys, I don’t want to go alone!” he glared at them in irritation.

“Okay, we’re coming,” Terry said hesitantly. He reluctantly came inside with the others.

“See that thing on the floor?” Bailey gestured towards the black shape in the distance.

“Yeah.”

“Was that there before?”

“Nope.”

“We’ve got to check it out. Mark and Corey might be hurt.”

“Or dead,” Cameron interjected.

Bailey tiptoed towards the break area until he was close enough to see that the thing on the floor wasn’t a shadow at all. His mouth hung open in stunned disbelief and when he tried to speak, no words came out.

Pete’s body was gone. The bloodstained welding blanket he’d been cocooned in was shredded, like he’d torn his way out from inside, and the conduit reamer that had been lodged in his eye socket lay discarded several feet away.

“He was still alive?!” Noah gaped in terror.

“No way, he was dead. Nobody could’ve survived that!” Waylon said. He couldn’t pry his gaze from the bloodied fabric.

Jeremy was highly alarmed. “Pete’s not dead anymore, is he?”

“Jeremy, that’s ridiculous,” Eric accused. “A dead person can’t just get up and-”

_Scccchhlorpp!_

Nine heads snapped up at the sudden noise.

“What the FUCK was that?” Sam asked.

They heard it again, a repulsive sticky sucking sound, as if someone was slurping mucus through a straw. Faint animalistic, almost alien snuffling accompanied it. The sounds were coming from somewhere behind the break area.

Bailey didn’t move. A tingling chill spread throughout his bones, rooting him to the spot. Whatever was making that sound was dangerous, unfamiliar and eldritch in nature. A creature not local to any place on Earth.

“Are you going to check that out?” Noah inquired quietly.

“Why me?” Bailey asked pathetically.

“You’re the only one with a weapon.”

“But I’m scared!” Bailey cringed against the wall of their break cabin. He wasn’t going back there. What good would a drill do against what was surely a huge monster that wanted to eat his flesh?

Terry picked up the conduit reamer. The blood on it was still wet, but he did his best to ignore it. “I’ll come with you. Okay?”

“We should all go. There’s nine of us, one of it.” Sam spoke up. “The rest of us can get its attention, then you guys attack it.”

“Okay. We go over there, see what we’re dealing with. You guys distract it, me and Terry will fuck it up. Sound like a plan?” Bailey pitched. He was scared shitless but felt slightly more confident knowing that he wasn’t going to face the monster alone.

The sucking and snuffling noises amplified as the group stealthily crept along the side of their break cabin and headed down the path towards the south eastern section of the building. The monster was close by. As much as he wanted to run away in the opposite direction, Bailey forced himself to peek out of cover to see what awaited him. 

The path ahead lead to the plant’s water testing equipment. This section of the building was split into two halves, with a spacious open area overlooking the basement in the middle that divided the south eastern and south western sections of the building’s first floor. Several gangboxes and portable tool shelves were clustered together near the railing. To the left of the railing was the creature. Bailey froze up in terror at the sight of it.

There, hunched over near the little water testing cottage, was Pete. He no longer resembled anything human. He’d mutated excessively; his limbs were grossly elongated, the upper section of his head transformed into a large set of jaws lined with needle like teeth, his body was bulbous and tumor like in some areas while saggy and deflated in others, and a series of long sinewy tentacles had emerged from his mouth and chest. Several of the tentacles were probed into the corpses of Mark and Corey, twitching as they sucked blood and fused with them. Most of Pete’s clothing was reduced to shreds. Only a few tattered scraps of his shirt and jeans remained looped around his deformed limbs.

Bailey flung himself back against the wall, out of its sight.

“It’s...it’s a, uh...” he stammered uselessly. “Just see for yourselves!”

“Oh god,” Terry paled at the sight of it and clutched the reamer so hard his knuckles cracked. “What the hell is that?!”

“It’s Pete. He turned into that..that _thing.”_

By now the whole group had seen the monster, and most of them were struggling not to run away screaming. Nobody shouted, but it was only a matter of time before they’d be detected anyways. Someone would scream, fall over or make noise, giving away their hiding spot.

“What are we going to do?” Jay asked. He was gripping a piece of 3/8” rod, but realized how useless it would be after laying eyes on the Pete creature.

“Mark and Corey both have guns, but we’ve got to lure the monster away from them. Those shelves over there are full of stuff we could use as weapons. That one on the right is unlocked.” Waylon said. “Here’s the plan. Some of us will distract that thing, the rest of you run for the shelves. Bailey, Terry, if you have a shot, take it. I don’t care what you do, hurt it somehow. Keep its attention. We’ve got to get those guns.”

The sucking stopped and was replaced by an elastic stretching. Noah cautiously glimpsed around the corner.

A thin, slimy stalk grew up out of the creature’s toothy upper jaws. The flesh on the end split and flowered open, revealing a single blazing orange eye that caught sight of Noah. The Pete creature let out a deep, undulating wail that sounded like many voices speaking as one and rapidly withdrew its tentacles from the bodies on the floor. Its extra appendages flexed back in a defensive stance as it stood up fully and screeched at its prey.

“It saw me! Go!” Noah shouted.

Bailey stumbled out of cover, but the drill was limp in his hand and what little courage he had drained away as the monster advanced on him.

“Over here!” Waylon called out and threw a steel conduit fitting at it. The part bounced off harmlessly, but the monster turned its hideous head towards him. “Come get me you pussy!”

The abomination howled and charged at him.

“Shitshitshitshit!” Waylon darted inside the cottage and slammed the door shut behind him. Thin veiny tentacles wormed their way in underneath the doorframe, stretching out and reaching for him. They stiffened, grew small spiky bristles and poked at his boots and the cuff of his jeans, searching for entry. One of them started inching up his leg like a soft, fleshy millipede. Waylon unleashed a girlish scream and flailed about to get it off him, then staggered backwards out of their grasp and looked up in time to see the monster snarl and turn away from the glass.

Terry had hit it with the reamer, burying the sharp metal cone deep into its back and distracting it, giving Bailey an opening.

Bailey held the drill’s trigger and ran at the creature from behind, impaling the bit deep into its slimy flesh. Clumps of gore oozed from the wound. The thing cried out in pain, a howl that was half human and half otherworldly. Small red tendrils coasted out of the jagged hole in its back and enveloped the drill bit, clogging it up and stopping it. They flowed up the bit, coated the exterior of the drill and shorted its motor before sending it shooting backwards, ripping it out of Bailey’s hand in the process. A new tentacle sluiced out of the hole, squirming and holding the drill out of reach.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding.” Bailey said flatly. 

In one fluid motion the drill wielding tentacle lashed him across the face hard enough to split his lip open and knock him to the floor, then it whipped around and violently bashed Terry over the head, dropping him to his knees.

Bailey spat blood onto the floor and looked over to see a thick veiny tentacle slithering towards him, ready to latch on to him with its multiple rows of lamprey like teeth. Dark red blood sprayed as it was suddenly cut into. Jay, armed with a sawzall, severed the writhing appendage with a well timed slice.

The rest of the group, all holding various types of weapons, circled around the monster.

Sam whipped it with a chain wrench, Eric bashed at tentacles with a sledgehammer and Noah jabbed at it with a piece of pipe. The creature bled and and snarled angrily, but it didn’t seem hurt.

“It’s not working, we’re just making it mad!” Sam panicked.

“Keep going! It’s confused! It doesn’t know who to go for!” Eric assured.

Cameron prowled behind it, armed with a thick length of chain. He lashed the monster, but the chain looped around one of its arms and got yanked out of his hand. It grabbed him by the neck and forcefully flung him back against a series of panels on the cottage wall, briefly stunning him.

Underneath all the commotion, Jeremy saw his opening. Mark’s gun laid several feet away and he lunged for it, only for his body to betray him again. A dizzying wave of vertigo overtook him and in his hazy feverish state, he had to resort to crawling towards the gun. He picked it up and took aim at the creature, which was coiling a tentacle around Sam’s arm. He fired.

Jeremy was normally a great shot as he’d been hunting since he was nine, but he was half conscious and teetering unsteadily on his knees. Three of the five shots he fired missed. He got lucky with the sixth and landed a headshot, staggering the creature. It crashed into a shelf, haphazardly knocking its contents all over. A can of Instant-Galv liquid zinc fell into its jaws.

Waylon snatched up Corey’s gun and aimed at it.

“Shoot the can!” Jeremy pointed to it.

The monster thrashed about frantically and Waylon missed three times before finally striking the can. It ruptured with a loud bang, sending the remnants of the can hurtling over Jay’s shoulder and coating the monster’s head and upper torso in highly flammable opaque grey liquid.

It groaned in a eerily human voice as six long, bony insect like limbs sprouted from its back. Yellow slime spilled as they reached up and hooked to the ladder like run of cable tray above it. Its tentacles grabbed onto the rungs and it began lifting itself up and away from danger.

“Fuck! It’s getting away!” Bailey said.

“No it’s not.” Waylon shot the cable tray, severing one of the conductors inside of it.

A shower of sparks rained down onto the Pete thing, igniting the liquid zinc and setting it ablaze. It howled demonically and thrashed about as the flames singed its flesh, burning it cell by cell. The blackened tentacles went limp, the roasted insect legs snapped off and the flaming monster fell to the floor. Within a few minutes it was reduced to a charred black husk, but they let it continue to burn just to be sure it was truly dead.

Nobody spoke for a very long time.

*********************************

“I’ve only got seven bullets left.” Waylon slid the magazine back into Mark’s pistol. “How about you?”

“Uh, four, I think?” Jeremy replied. He was spaced out, swaying on his feet and teetering on the verge of fainting.

“Cool. That means we can kill eleven of those freaks outside and get murdered when the other ninety gang up on us,” Bailey said sarcastically. “We need more guns.”

“I’ve got a hunting rifle in my truck.” Jay chimed in. “A couple boxes of ammo. I was going to head out tonight.”

“Same here. My shotgun’s ready, I’ve just got to go out and get it.” Sam added.

Terry glared at them. “That would have been nice to know _before_ we fought that thing.” He was sitting on the floor with his back to the railing and chain smoking.

“How was I supposed to know that would happen? I didn’t get up this morning and think, ‘Hmm, I better keep my shotgun on me today just in case my foreman gets murdered and turns into a monster.’” Sam retorted.

“Guys, don’t fight. That won’t solve anything,” Jay diffused the situation before it elevated.

A bright red light on a nearby motor control panel captured Cameron’s attention and lured him away from the group. It beckoned to him and he was unable to resist its call. He blatantly ignored Bailey’s repeated request to come back.

_Fuck Bailey. He’s just a stupid apprentice. What does he know?_

As Cameron approached the panel, his thoughts were intruded by the same unknown hostility he’d felt earlier. They overtook him, burrowing inside his head. He stared unblinking at the red light light on the panel. It burned into his retinas, but he was completely transfixed and couldn’t look away. He didn’t want to look away. He wanted to stare at the light forever, absorbing it. Someone called his name but he didn’t respond. Cameron let the red light swallow him.

_Come inside and don’t ever leave me._

“Cam?” Bailey lightly shook him, snapping him out of his trance.

“Huh?” Cameron asked in a stupor.

“We’re going to get the guns. You coming?”

“Uh, yeah. Sure.”

“You good?”

“Yeah.”

“Alright.”

Bailey gave him a questioning glance before walking away.

*************************************

Jay scanned over the parking lot from the plant’s exterior deck. He shivered slightly, though he wasn’t sure if it was from the cool night air or the ominous silence surrounding the plant. It was unnaturally quiet, like all the wildlife had died when the strange robed people showed up. 

Their arrival didn’t make sense. Callahan power plant was located on a wooded peninsula five miles off the freeway, and there weren’t any houses or commercial buildings in the immediate vicinity. The woods didn’t offer any decent hiding places for a such a big congregation of cultists. Had they walked down the freeway? That didn’t make much sense, surely someone would have called the cops if they saw a massive horde of cult members stalking down the interstate. Had they been hiding in the woods all day, patiently waiting for night to fall before revealing themselves? Were they supernatural? A by product of whatever had caused Pete to go insane and mutate into a monster? 

It was too much for Jay’s relatively simple mind to compute. He turned towards Sam, who accompanied him. Waylon and Terry had the guns, as well as a pair of radios, and they were going to serve as look outs in case things went south.

“I don’t think any of them came inside the fence.” Jay said. “Watch out for us. If there’s trouble we’ll run right back, with or without the guns.”

“We’ve got you.” Terry assured. “You’ll be fine.”

“I sure hope so,” Sam said uneasily. He clipped a radio to his belt. Nervousness gnawed away at him. He felt safer inside than out in the open. Out here he’d be a sitting duck.

“Ready?” Jay asked. He had his keys in his hand.

“I guess,” Sam replied, sounding more confident than he felt.

The pair descended the metal steps to the courtyard below, swept it for threats and noticed with unease that the cultists were all gone. It did nothing to make them feel safer. The cultists were out of sight for now, but both Sam and Jay knew they hadn’t gone far. Their presence could still be felt.

“This is weird. I can’t see them, but I can still _feel_ them watching me. I don’t like it.” Jay commented as they approached the line of vehicles.

“Me neither. Stay close.” Sam responded.

Sam’s truck was the first in line, only a couple feet from the gate, and Jay’s was one car behind his. 

Jay silently climbed into the bed of his truck and opened up the storage box. It had a gun rack inside of it. He lifted his rifle out, quickly loaded it and stuffed the rest of the bullets into his pockets. He looked over the truck’s roof at Sam, who was rummaging around in his backseat.

“Did you get it?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Sam held his loaded shotgun up with one hand. “But I could have sworn I had more ammo.”

“Find it fast, I’m getting a really bad feeling about this,” Jay urged him as he clambered back down onto the ground. Hundreds of unseen eyes bore into him from the woods. He wanted to turn and run, but couldn’t bring himself to leave Sam behind.

He shifted uncomfortably and looked up at the impossibly dark sky. It was an oppressive mass of pure black, completely devoid of stars. So dark he couldn’t tell where the trees ended and the skyline began.

“Sam?” he called out.

“What’s wrong?” Sam asked.

“The sky is so _black._ I can’t see any stars.” Jay said.

Sam started to respond, but he was cut off as his radio crackled to life and a panicked voice came through. 

“Movement to your left! Come back, now!”

A flash of red sprang out from behind one of the vehicles, its knife raised. 

Jay wasn’t quick enough to avoid it. For a split second, he was unaware of what happened. Then searing white hot pain exploded through him as the blade plunged deeper into his gut. The knife jerked upwards and an arc of blood fanned out as his torso was cleaved open. Something heavy, warm and wet splattered all over his feet and he suddenly felt much lighter. Confused, he looked down. 

_Oh._ That wasn’t right.

Some of his intestines had fallen out and splayed across his feet, and he was bleeding. A lot. A red, slippery object oozed from the wound and landed on his left foot with a squelch.

Jay’s knees gave out and he toppled backwards to the ground.

The cultist, their blade glistening with fresh blood, stood over him. They appreciated their work for a brief moment before turning their attention towards Sam and charging at him.

Sam barely had time to react. He raised his gun and panic fired. It was a direct hit, the cultist’s chest ruptured in a cascade of blood and they crumpled.

He was running before they even hit the asphalt, but he didn’t get far. Another cultist suddenly intercepted him from the right, slamming him against Noah’s sedan, pinning him down and sending his shotgun clattering to the ground.

A bleached goat skull surrounded by red robes hovered over him. The cultist’s gloved hand clamped around his neck, crushing his throat and leaving him choking for air while their blade teased against his cheek, making a shallow cut. The knife left his face as the figure drew it back, ready to butcher him.

Hot liquid hit Sam's face as a deafening shot rang out and the weight pinning him in place fell away. He snapped his eyes open in shock. The cultist was laying in front of him, dead from a headshot. He pawed at his face and saw blood on his hands when he pulled them away.

“Come on! We need to go!” Terry and Waylon stood in front of him. In his crippling fear he hadn’t even noticed them come running to his aid.

Reeling from the gunshot and his bruised throat, Sam tried to regain his composure but almost fell down instead. He picked up his gun and turned towards the building, but made the mistake of glancing over at Jay.

Half of Jay’s guts had spilled out during the attack and a sizable pool of blood had already collected around his body. It continued to expand as he bled out.

Sam couldn’t look away, not even when more cultists darted out from the blackness.

“Sam! There’s no time! Let’s go!” Terry shouted at him and yanked him by the arm.

Sam didn’t bother shooting at the incoming cultists, he turned and bolted back towards the plant, Waylon and Terry closely tailing him. They didn’t stop running until they crashed through the front door and were safely back inside with everyone else. Sam stopped and bent over, panting from exhaustion.

“Noah, lock that door!” Waylon ordered.

“Why?” Noah asked.

“Don’t question me, boy! Just do it!”

“Okay,” he obeyed and locked it shut. “What happened?”

“They got in!” Sam said.

Bailey looked around in alarm. “Where’s Jay?”

“Dead,” Terry said solemnly.

“What?! What happened out there?” Eric demanded.

“They got him,” Sam responded quickly. “One of those assholes came out of nowhere and gutted him! I saw the whole thing!”

“Calm down, Sam.” Cameron said coolly. He was leaning against a wooden workbench, as if he was bored by all the commotion.

“Calm down?” Sam stood up and walked over to him. “Are you seriously telling me to calm down? Jay’s dead! He just got brutally murdered right in front of me!” he was shouting now but Cameron didn’t flinch. “I barely got away! I almost DIED back there and you want me to calm down?!”

Cameron slapped Sam so hard the sound ricocheted throughout the room.

“Cameron, what the hell!” Eric yelled at him.

“Shut up, Eric.” Cameron calmly shushed him with a dismissive wave.

Sam glowered furiously at him, holding a hand to his stinging cheek. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

Cameron only smirked in response.


	6. Isolated

Five cultists stood at the bottom of the stairs, surrounding it in a tight half circle. Dozens more loitered behind them. They’d formed neat, organized rows of ten, as if they’d been choreographing for weeks beforehand.

Noah turned away from the window. “They’re still out there. Watching. Waiting.”

No one replied. Group morale was rapidly dropping. A fight nearly broke out after Cameron pimp slapped Sam across the face, and the fact that Jay died for a shotgun and five shells loomed heavily over their heads. Five extra bullets wouldn’t even put a dent into the mob waiting outside.

Bailey leaned over a workbench and clasped his hands together, ready to share his thoughts.

“I took a nap during afternoon break today. Usually I don’t but today I was tired. I fell asleep and had a really strange dream.” he spoke up.

“Bailey, this isn’t the time for dream interpretation.” Cameron said from across the room. After he’d hit Sam, he’d been commanded to sit in the corner and even quarantined with a length of caution tape for some extra humiliation. He could walk away any time, but he was being surprisingly cooperative.

Bailey ignored him. “I dreamed that I was here alone and there was a door on the tenth floor. It was right there at the top of the stairs and lead to an old fashioned office. This red light was streaming through the windows and I realized I wasn’t alone. There was a woman in a red dress sitting at the desk. She was beautiful but there was something off and inhuman about her. It’s like I knew she was going to kill me but I didn’t care, I got on my knees and let her. She put her hands around my neck and squeezed, so hard. I couldn’t do anything, I couldn’t fight back. Thing is, I didn’t want to. She had complete control over me and I liked it. Right as she broke my neck I woke up. After that, something felt _different._ I could sense it. When I said I left my folding rule on the roof, that was a lie. I went up to the tenth floor to check for the door. Logically I knew it wasn’t really there, but I had to make sure. I didn’t say it before because I thought you’d all make fun of me.”

Sam looked over at him. “You felt it too?”

Everyone else clustered around the table, piqued by Bailey’s words. They listened intently.

“I should have said something sooner but I don’t think it would’ve made a difference.” Bailey said. “Everything that’s happened, the card readers crashing, the phone signals jamming, Pete, Jay, everything, it’s all because of them. I don’t know who those people are, but they want to kill us. They’re not going to stop and they’re not going to go away. We’ve got two options. Stay inside and wait to die, or fight back and get help.”

“Fight back? How? We’ve only got sixteen bullets! Even if we made every shot count it wouldn’t be enough. There’s over a hundred of those assholes out there. We’re outnumbered at least twelve to one.” Waylon said.

“We’ve got to try,” Bailey responded.

“I don’t know,” Sam interjected. “They’re fast. Really fast. Jay didn’t even see it coming. One second he was alive and talking to me, the next he was gutted and bleeding out on the ground.”

“He’s right. They’re too quick.” Terry added. “I’ll say this right now. I’m six foot four, two hundred sixty seven pounds and I don’t feel confident taking any of those fuckers without a gun.”

“Can I rejoin the group now?” Cameron interrupted from his corner. He rolled his eyes upon getting no response. “Guys, this isn’t kindergarten. Don’t treat me like a little kid!”

“Then stop acting like one,” Bailey shot back.

Eric leaned forwards and placed his hands on the table. “Say we do fight. We’d have to push our way through and climb the gate. Question is, what are we going to do about him?” he motioned to Jeremy, who was half conscious and curled up underneath a nearby workbench.

“We could use him as bait,” Cameron suggested. “Throw him to the horde while we climb the fence and get away.”

“Are you kidding me? How could you even think that?!” Noah asked, disgusted.

“He has a one hundred and eight degree fever. Last time I checked that shit’s fatal. He’ll be dead in a few hours anyway so what the big deal?” Cameron asked.

“That’s enough out of you! We’re not sacrificing anybody!” Terry seethed at him.

Jeremy twitched and mumbled something about onions.

Cameron slunk out of his corner and approached him. He crouched down to Jeremy’s level, prodded him and held up three fingers. 

“Hey Jeremy, how many fingers am I holding up? Come on, tell me. I know you’re awake, so quit ignoring me.”

“Cameron, that’s enough.” Waylon warned sternly. 

“Who am I? Say my name. Jeremy, say my name.” Cameron prodded Jeremy again but didn’t get an answer. The other man didn’t even react to his presence. For the past twenty minutes Jeremy had been doing nothing but muttering incoherently, shivering, groaning and puking on himself.

“See?” Cameron said smugly. “Dude doesn’t even know where he is. He’s pretty much dead already. You guys are just refusing to accept it.”

“Back off Cam. Get away from him. Go back over there.” Bailey pointed towards the corner Cameron had been banished to earlier. “Don’t make me knock you on your ass.”

Cameron scoffed at him but walked several paces away without a fight. An arrogant smirk crossed his face. He propped himself against the wall and slicked his hair back before speaking, his voice thick with amusement.

“Look at you, taking charge and stepping up. Maybe you’ve got some balls after all. I guess you’re the foreman now, Bailey. But you don’t have what it takes. I know you don’t. You’re in way over your head, little boy. You’ll regret stepping up, mark my words.”

“We’ll see about that.” Bailey replied robotically. Cameron had never been a jerk to him before, but in the past hour he’d become hostile and mean spirited. It wasn’t like him. It put Bailey on edge and the thought of Cameron getting a hold of one of the guns made him nervous.

Noah appeared by Bailey’s side. “I’ll keep an eye on him. Make sure he doesn’t try anything.” he offered. He looked Cameron straight in the eye, almost challenging him to move.

“Thanks Noah. Shout if he makes any sudden movements.” Bailey clapped him on the shoulder and walked over to the others, who were huddled up near a tan lockbox.

“We can’t let Cameron have a gun. I don’t trust him. You guys don’t know how hard he slapped me. Nearly knocked me over, and he did it for no reason.” Sam spoke up.

“I needed you to calm down, you were being hysterical.” Cameron interrupted again. “You know I can hear you, right?”

“Hey Cameron, how many fingers am I holding up?” Sam raised both of his middle fingers at him.

“Leave it, Sam. He’s being a dick but you need to ignore him.” Eric persuaded.

Waylon spoke next. “I hate to say it, but Cameron might be right about Jeremy. He’s deathly ill and can barely stand up on his own. It’s not safe for him out there.” 

“It’s not safe for any of us out there. If we’re really going to fight through the herd we need more guns.” Terry said.

“There aren’t any. Sixteen bullets. That’s all we’ve got.” Bailey said.

“That’s not enough! What do we do?” Terry asked.

Four people stared at him expecting a satisfactory answer, but Bailey didn’t let himself succumb to pressure. He found it a bit funny that a group of experienced journeymen were asking for his advice but focused on the task at hand and came up with a plan.

“First we get Jeremy somewhere safe. We can put him in the weight room on the mezzanine deck. Then we look for heavy weapons like circular saws. We could cut sheet metal and make knives. Anything that’ll do massive damage really fast.” Bailey proposed.

“Let’s do it.” Sam backed him up.

“We should all go together. Noah, Cam, you too.” Bailey said.

“It’s fine, I’ve got this. You guys go on, me and Cam will stay here and have a nice little chat.” Noah said confidently. 

“Are you sure?” Bailey asked, his voice tinged with concern.

Noah nodded reassuringly. “I’ll be fine.”

Bailey wasn’t entirely convinced, but he knew how stubborn Noah could be. Once he was committed to something it was tough to talk him out of it.

Eric got down on his knees and tried to coax Jeremy out of his hiding spot. 

“I know you don’t feel good but you’ve got to work with me, okay?” he asked.

Jeremy didn’t even try and wasn’t coherent enough to object when Terry grabbed him by the feet and gently dragged him out from under the bench. Eric and Terry switched positions, lifted him up and carried him towards the stairs. Jeremy’s eyes were half shut, his arms dangled uselessly and his neck flopped to the side like it was broken, but he was with it enough to speak.

“He’s watching you, Terry. Watching with his third eye,” he slurred. “When the purple light comes you won’t be able to look away.” 

Terry fidgeted uncomfortably. It was probably just the fever talking, but he couldn’t help but think there was some truth to what Jeremy was saying. That something was watching him, studying his every move, lurking in the darkness for the perfect moment to strike. It would wait for him to drop his guard, then pounce and infect him, turning him into something else. Something inhuman, but so cleverly disguised the others would never notice until it was too late.

Bailey lead the others down the stairs to the mezzanine deck, a subfloor between the first floor and the basement. It was home to many high voltage transformers, huge racks of switch gear, condenser units, half built scaffolds and arrays of cable tray. The mezzanine deck was one of the noisier floors when the plant was up and running, but now it was eerily quiet. Even the continuous electrical buzzing of the transformers seemed muffled.

The weight room was off to the side on the west wall. It was equipped with several treadmills, two rowing machines, a stair master, an elliptical machine, a bench press and a shelf of weight sets. Several full length mirrors were screwed to the wall and there was a smaller room containing a sink, a row of lockers and some cabinets off to the right.

Eric and Terry gingerly placed Jeremy on the floor and Sam set a bottle of water near his head.

“This room is safe, nothing’s going to get you in here.” Waylon explained. He hoped he was telling the truth.

Jeremy shifted and sat up as the others moved towards the door. The dazed confusion gradually left his face and was replaced with anxiety. “You’re leaving me?!”

“We’re going to go get help.” Sam explained. “We’ll be back before you know it.”

“That’s right. No one’s getting in here. You can lock the door from the inside, like this.” Waylon turned the lock several times for emphasis.

“No! Don’t leave me! It’s not safe! He’ll come for me if I’m alone!” Jeremy lunged at Bailey and grabbed a handful of his T shirt, pleading with him. “Please. Please don’t leave me.” His green eyes were wide with panic and he looked to be near tears.

Bailey wasn’t remotely prepared to deal with that possibility, but he had to say something. “It is safe in here. It is. Just trust me, okay? We’ll check on you every twenty minutes.” He felt bad about telling such a blatant lie, but it was better than telling the ugly truth. He had no way of knowing what could happen during that time.

“You promise?” Jeremy asked.

“I promise.” Bailey assured. He’d promised, now he had to commit to it. As long as he was able he’d check back in twenty minutes no matter what. 

He left the room and shut the door behind him. The lock clicked into place a second later and eased his worries a bit.

The air temperature was higher than it had been a minute ago, though nobody else noticed. The others headed towards the stairs, but Bailey took a moment to glance over the railing. Warm stale air drifted up from the basement. It smelled faintly like a load of laundry that had been left in the washer overnight. His first thought was that a nearby steam pipe was leaking, but he couldn’t see or hear any steam plumes. There was no movement in the basement. It had the facade of being still and lifeless, yet Bailey felt that it was teeming with activity. The shadows hid things, terrible beings that beckoned him to venture down alone. They’d toy with him and mimic the voice of someone he knew to draw him further into in the blackness. He’d hear Noah or Jeremy or maybe even his mother, calling out for help. Maybe he’d even see what genuinely appeared to be a person, laying prone and helpless on the floor, before being attacked from behind.

Realization struck and a chill jolted through him. He _was_ alone. The others had gone back upstairs, leaving him behind to get snatched into the darkness.

Bailey bolted up the stairs, back to the light, back to the others.

“Did you see something down there?” Terry asked.

“No. I, uh...I just got freaked out over nothing,” Bailey admitted. “The basement looked creepy. From now on, none of us go down there alone.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Eric said.

“Come on, let’s check on Cam and Noah,” Bailey said. 

Leaving them alone had been a mistake and Bailey knew it. Cameron was right, he wasn’t foreman material. All his life Bailey had been perfectly content being a follower, and now that he’d stepped up he doubted himself. There was no way he could speak for the group and make all the right choices. Instead he saw himself screwing up and making decisions that would get someone hurt or even killed. Noah was one of his best friends and he couldn’t stand the thought of Cameron doing something awful to him. He should have been more adamant not leaving them alone together.

He rounded the corner and let out a breath of relief. 

Neither Noah nor Cameron had moved. Cameron was still propped against the pillar and Noah was hunched over the workbench keeping a watchful eye on him.

“I’m really glad you’re okay. I was worried,” Bailey said as he joined Noah at the table.

Cameron raised his hands in frustration. “Of course he’s okay. What did you think I was going to do? Kill him? I can’t believe you people!”

“He didn’t do anything,” Noah said. “He’s calmed down a lot.”

“Good,” Bailey replied. Everybody was safe for now, but the horde of cultists outside was a problem he didn’t know how to take care of. If they all had guns, they’d have a chance. Long range melee weapons could work, but there was the very real possibility that some of them could die trying to fight through the crowd. As he racked his mind for a solution, something caught his eye.

A small flag of red plastic was snagged on the corner of the table. Bailey picked it up. It was a piece of boundary tape marked with white letters spelling the words _fresh air._

Everything clicked into place and Bailey solved the puzzle. He turned towards Noah.

“I’ve got an idea.”


	7. Kill it with fire

_“Flamethrowers?”_ Noah was stuck between skeptical disbelief and giddy excitability, though the heightening pitch of his voice indicated he leaned towards the latter.

“That’s right,” Bailey confirmed.

“Seriously?”

“Yes.”

A wide grin spread across Noah’s face. “That... is fucking AWESOME!”

Bailey couldn’t help but smile at Noah’s enthusiasm. “It is. We’re going to need some empty tanks, preferably ones with pneumatic fittings already attached to them, otherwise we’ll have to do some retrofitting. We can take the hoses and triggers off the propane torches. We’ll need the blow torches too.”

“Why don’t we just turn the propane torches into flamethrowers?” Noah asked.

“The tanks are too small. We’d burn through fuel really fast,” Sam explained.

Bailey jotted down a materials list on a piece of scrap paper. “How many full refill tanks do we have down there?” he inquired.

“Two, maybe?” Terry said. He was the last one to refill the propane torches, but that had been several weeks ago.

“That should be enough.” Bailey wrote down a couple more things.

When the group was ready, they ventured into the basement and assessed their inventory. A quick check of the refill tanks yielded disappointing results. One was full, another was at forty percent capacity and the others were empty. The two blow torches, along with the propane torches, were sealed up in a red cabinet with prominent signs reading _Danger! Flammable materials_ on each door. A padlock hung from the latching mechanism. 

Eric tugged on the lock. “Do we have a bolt cutter? I don’t exactly feel like searching Pete’s corpse for the key.”

“Jeremy has one,” Sam said. 

Waylon wrangled an empty tank from one of the gangboxes. It was old, dirty and covered in partially eroded warning labels, but it was still functional. A thin hose was coupled to it.

“Nice! Another one of those and we’ll be in business!” Terry beamed.

It gave Bailey a small shred of hope. They’d be able to make at least one flamethrower for sure. It might be enough, and the might was all Bailey needed. He called everyone’s attention and formed a game plan.

“We’ll split into three groups. Sam and Noah, see what you can find. Terry and Eric, same thing. Waylon and Cam are with me, we’ll get the key from Jeremy.” he announced.

“What if he’s dead?” Cameron asked.

“He’s not,” Bailey snipped, only then realizing that he’d forgotten to check on Jeremy. Twenty minutes had come and gone a while ago. “You’ve all got a list, you know what to look for. We’ll meet back here in fifteen minutes. Sound good?” 

“Yeah,” Noah said with a smile. “Let’s build some flamethrowers!”

*****************************************

The growing pain in his chest grew worse by the minute, and Eric feared he wouldn’t be able to hide it for much longer. He’d first noticed it an hour ago. It started as a minor ache, but as time wore on it intensified until he felt as if his ribs were expanding and splintering, tiny shards of bone poking his lungs. He’d cracked a rib once before, but this pain was invasive and evenly spread. It felt like his bones were physically changing, enlarging and curving inwards. At one point he thought he felt something _move_ inside him. 

_It’s all in your head. There’s nothing inside you. You’ll be fine,_ he reassured himself.

The pain suddenly spiked and interrupted his thoughts. He let out a quiet gasp and subtly clawed at his chest, but Terry caught it right away.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I’ll live,” Eric lied. “I think one of my ribs is broken, I took one hell of a hit earlier.”

They walked in silence for a few minutes, sweeping their flashlights over ancient beams and pipe racks shrouded with cobwebs. An electrical contractor’s hub area was tucked away in a little niche off to the side.

“Bound to be something over there,” Terry walked over to the wooden clamshell shelves. They were padlocked shut, but the metal clasp could be busted off with some effort. He jammed a pipe inside the clasp and started prying at it.

Eric absently scanned the other shelves, not actually seeing anything he looked at, instead gazing through them. The pain kicked up another notch and he was having trouble focusing. He grit his teeth and tried to tamp it down when he felt it again. A squirming sensation radiated through the right side of his chest, almost like something was wriggling against his lung. Again he told himself that nothing was wrong, that he was imagining it, that he’d be okay. _I’m fine._ He repeated the words in his head, believing them less and less each time.

“When I was twelve, I decided to smoke one of my dad’s cigars,” Terry spoke up as he worked the shelves. The clasp cracked and groaned but didn’t budge. “It seemed like such a sophisticated, adult thing to do. My dad always looked so cool and collected when he smoked. I wanted to be cool too, so I waited until my parents went out one evening, swiped a cigar and lit it up. I wasn’t a smart kid, so I smoked it in the living room, sitting on that ugly brown sofa we had. Turns out my mom forgot her wallet. When I heard their car in the driveway, I jumped three feet in the air and dropped the cigar on the sofa. That thing went up in flames instantly! My parents came home to find the sofa on fire and my dumb ass trying to put it out. My mom looked at me and in a calm voice said, ‘Terry James Watson, go to your room.’ She’d never called me by my full name before, so I knew I was in some seriously deep shit.”

The clasp popped off and tumbled to the floor, taking several slivers of wood with it. Terry rooted around the shelf’s contents and took a package of metal zip ties.

“I never meant to set the sofa on fire,” he continued. “That was an accident. But now I’m building a flamethrower so I can set people on fire. People that want to kill us. I’m going to burn them alive so I can live. So we can live. I think I can do it. Waylon killed the guy who attacked Sam. Shot him in the head. I raised my gun too but he shot first. He didn’t even think about it, he just did it. He told me afterwards that he was shocked at how easy it had been to kill the guy. I sure as shit am not ready to check out yet, so when we go out there, I’ll do it. I’ll light them up.”

Eric wasn’t listening. Though his face was relatively calm, the pain consumed him and the now constant internal squirming sensation spread to his left side. He wasn’t okay.

“Killing someone...what do you think it’ll feel like?” Terry asked.

“I don’t know,” Eric admitted. He looked at Terry somberly, his eyes glazed over. “But when the time comes, you’ll do the right thing.”

******************************************

He’d been left alone for what had to be hours, but eventually Jeremy heard footsteps outside his door. It was probably _him._ If it was, Jeremy might as well give up and die. In his current state, his defenses were limited to two completely worthless options. He could either throw his half empty water bottle at the monster or use harsh language, but he didn’t have the energy to do either one.

He barely reacted when the door opened.

“Told you he’d be dead,” Cameron’s voice filled the room.

“He’s not dead, Cameron.” Bailey said irritably. “He just moved.”

“Bailey?” With strenuous effort, Jeremy managed to sit up. “You said twenty minutes,” he said glumly.

“Sorry about that,” Bailey apologized. Waylon slunk in behind him and Cameron posted himself by the door. “We got sidetracked. But the good news is we’ve got a plan. We’re going to build flamethrowers to fight those psychos outside. We just need your combustibles key.”

Jeremy slumped against a rowing machine. “Bailey, I don’t want to stay in here anymore.”

“You need to. This room is safe.” Waylon assured. 

“You’re wrong. I hear weird things out there.” Jeremy replied. Cameron’s icy, unfeeling gaze bored into him from across the room and he fidgeted uncomfortably.

Bailey knelt in front of him and extended his hand. “Do you have the key?”

Jeremy reached into his pocket and withdrew his tangled mass of keys, then stopped, suddenly anxious and unsure. Bailey passively and patiently waited for him, but something about him was _off._ Waylon stood to the side and Cameron watched over them all in a hawklike fashion. Jeremy clutched the keys as a tide of uncertainty washed over him. He was lucid and alert now, but in five minutes he might not be. Was it really a good idea to give his key to Bailey? The nagging voice in his head urged him to reconsider.

“I’ll give it to Waylon.”

“Why not me? What’s the matter?” Bailey asked gently. He was taken aback by Jeremy’s next words.

“I don’t trust you.”

********************************************

Two roughly built flamethrowers lay on the floor. Neither one could be worn, but they’d get the job done. Cameron syphoned propane from the refill canisters into the flamethrower tanks.

“Can we do this upstairs? I’m getting the creeps.” Sam looked around nervously.

“Almost done, no need to get your panties in a twist.” Cameron said.

Sam scowled but didn’t reply. 

Bailey glanced up and noticed the group was one short.

“Where’s Eric?” he questioned.

Terry slowly realized his partner missing. “Oh crap,” he said. 

“Terry, where is Eric?” Bailey asked again.

“I don’t know.” Terry admitted.

“You don’t know? He was your partner, you were supposed to be watching him!”

“He was right behind me a couple minutes ago!”

They jumped as a loud crash came from up ahead. A trio of unsettling sounds met their ears; falling items clanking against the floor combined with shuffling footsteps and groans of pain.

“Shit,” Noah said. “Cam, hurry up!”

“Got it.” Cameron removed the syphon hose and closed the tank’s valve.

Eric staggered into view and braced himself against a cement support column. His face twisted into a grimace and he tore frantically at his chest, like he was trying to rip himself apart.

“Eric, what happened?” Bailey foolishly approached him.

“Stay away from me! I’m infected!” Eric shouted through clenched teeth. 

“But you aren’t-”

“I SAID GET AWAY!” Eric roughly shoved Bailey to the floor and flung himself several yards away. “All of you. Stay away from me. I can feel it growing inside me. Moving, _feeding._ You...you’ve got to kill me. It’s the only way.”

“No. I can’t!” Sam protested.

“You have to. Somebody shoot me! It’s inside me!” Eric moaned in agony and stumbled about in a zigzag pattern. A deep, hollow rumbling came from within his chest.

Noah backed away from him and Bailey refused to comply. He already had one murder to his name and didn’t want to make it two, even if it was a mercy kill.

Terry also defied the order. “I’m sorry, I...I won’t,” he said.

“Kill me! Please!” Eric pleaded. The rumbling got louder.

Melancholy acceptance swept over Waylon’s face and he sighed deeply. He withdrew his gun and aimed at Eric but was unable to pull the trigger. “This isn’t right.” He lowered his weapon. “I can’t. You have a wife, a daughter. I just...sorry Eric.”

Cameron began edging towards one of the flamethrowers.

“Please,” Eric begged. “Make it stop.”

Disabling bolts of pain ripped through him and he fell to his knees. White stars swam in his vision and he collapsed onto the floor. His limbs stiffened, his back arched and he felt a series of wet _pops_ on both sides of his ribcage. His bones shattered and his screams were cut short as his chest ruptured. Blood and bone fragments splattered outwards, leaving a grotesque hole in his chest. Dark blood streaked down the hinges of flesh dangling from the rim of the wound.

“Jesus,” Sam stammered. “We should’ve shot him.”

A segmented tentacle fired out from Eric’s chest, making everyone shout and leap back. It stretched upwards, narrowing and looping itself around an overhead pipe. A fleshy spider like creature roughly the size of a basketball emerged from the hole and began hoisting itself up. It had twelve thin legs, each one ending in a curve of bone that had once been part of Eric’s ribcage. The tip of each leg tapered to a sharp point. Bone clinked against metal as the spider creature gripped onto the pipe and retracted the tentacle back into its revolting gelatinous body.

“Nope,” Waylon grabbed a flamethrower, aimed at the creature and pulled the trigger. A jet of orange flames shot out and engulfed the spider. It emitted a high pitched screech as the fire singed its slimy flesh and burned it alive. Its blackened, charred corpse fell to the floor.

“Good, now torch him.” Cameron motioned to Eric.

“Are you crazy?!” Waylon gaped.

“You saw what just happened! He’s still a threat. He’s going to change just like Pete did!” Cameron argued.

“I am not setting Eric on fire!” Waylon shouted back at him.

Eric’s fingers twitched and started to elongate. They bonelessly stretched out like taffy, reaching for the closest person. Thin black tendrils wormed their way out of Eric’s ruined chest, slithering down his sides. A few of them dropped to the floor as he sat up.

Cameron wrenched the flamethrower nozzle out of Waylon’s hands and squeezed the trigger, bathing the Eric-Thing in flames. An inhuman wail pierced the air and it thrashed about manically as it succumbed to a fiery death. Its burned limbs curled and went stiff.

“You’re welcome,” Cameron violently shoved the flamethrower nozzle at Waylon, knocking him back a step. “Now’s not the time to get soft. If you want to survive, you’ve got to make the tough calls. Unlike you, I’m willing to do what needs to be done.”

“You’re an asshole,” Waylon said.

“But I’m also right. I called it. I said Eric was going to turn, and guess what? While you were standing there crying and moaning about morals, he turned! I took action and eliminated the threat. That’s why I’m going to survive. It’s not my fault you’re a pussy.” Cameron retorted. 

Bailey examined the Eric-Thing’s burning corpse with morbid fascination until he was struck with a petrifying realization. “Guys...” he said loudly enough to capture everyone’s attention. 

“We never burned Jay.”

**********************************************

It was a subtle change, but Jeremy caught it. The dull glimmer in Bailey’s eye gave it away. He was infected, and Jeremy strongly suspected Cameron was infected too. They didn’t need his key, they wanted him to drop his guard. Bailey-- or rather, the thing that had been Bailey-- had knelt in front of him in a supposedly friendly gesture, but Jeremy saw right through its act.

It was a trap, and he visualized how it would’ve gone down: he’d hand over his keys and the Bailey-Thing would attack him while the Cameron-Thing slammed the door shut and took care of Waylon. He’d given his keys to Waylon instead, which must have thwarted the monster’s plans as they all left after that. The imposters were gone for now, but they’d be back.

Even in his foggy, delirious state, Jeremy knew his outlook was poor. Unless he got to a hospital immediately, his chance of survival was next to none. He had an hour, two if he was lucky, before his organs failed and his critically overheated body shut down for good. It wouldn’t be the worst way to go. At least he’d die intact and in relative peace. What happened to Pete and Jay, _that_ was horrible. His death would be quaint in comparison. He’d simply wait for the lights to go out forever. 

As long as he could hide from the monsters.

Staying in his so called safe room wasn’t an option. He didn’t care what Waylon said, it was about as safe as strutting across an I beam without fall protection. If he stayed in here, he might as well put up a sign declaring _Attention all monsters! I’m in here! Please kill me!_ Only a minute ago he’d heard commotion outside; shouting, then screaming (Eric?) followed by more shouting and frantic footsteps pounding up the stairs. He understood what happened. Someone mutated and everyone else ran off. He needed to leave. _Now._

There was one place he could go. He’d found it a couple months back and was certain no one else knew. It would be safe. He could hide there, curl up and die on his own terms. If he was swift, he’d make it there with no problems. He was going to die anyway, but he couldn’t stand the thought of coming back as one of those things.

Jeremy unsteadily lifted himself off the floor and stood up. Exhaustion swept over him, his bones ached and he was sweating heavily despite being freezing cold. When he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror, he wasn’t surprised to see his skin had taken on a sickly yellowish pallor. Physically he wasn’t in the condition to walk up ten flights of stairs, but it was the only place he’d be safe. For a second, he considered collapsing back onto the floor, but decided against it. He’d be caught and infected if he stayed. Just because he had one foot in the grave didn’t mean he wanted to be pulled in head first against his will. He shambled over to the door, unlocked it and stepped out.

All was quiet now. The plant was unnervingly silent and deserted. He was on his own with no one left to protect him, but their absence was welcome. They were being taken over one by one, and if any of them were still human they’d be infected before long.

He shuffled over to the staircase and began his ascent. His limbs felt like lead weights and his lucidity was slipping away again, but he was determined to reach his destination. A voice called out to him from the basement but he ignored it. He wasn’t falling for that trick.

“Jeremy? Please, help me.” the voice spoke again. It sounded like Sam.

_That’s not Sam. Keep going._ Jeremy stumbled up the steps, leaving the thing in the basement behind. It didn’t follow.

The tenth floor was darker than before, and the few old florescent fixtures did little to light it up. Through the weak light, ominous shadows waved and danced on the wall, exaggerating the spider web of cracks that spread across it. Oddly, they appeared to start in the center of the wall despite there being no obvious damage. Jeremy briefly paused to look at them. He didn’t remember them being that big.

They weren’t important. He lumbered over to a row of antiquated cast iron coal burning furnaces on the right side of the deck. Each one was affixed with an old incandescent light, illuminating their heavy circular doors. The lights still worked, but the furnaces were all rusted shut save for the one on the far end of the row. Its door was open a few inches.

The warm, inviting light coming from the furnace fixture beckoned him in. He stepped up to the furnace, pulled the door open and peered inside. Only darkness greeted him, but it was comforting instead of unsettling. It would offer solace.

Jeremy crawled inside. It was nice and spacious, giving him plenty of room to move around. His movement kicked up clouds of coal soot older than he was, but that didn’t bother him. He pulled the door mostly shut.

All he could see was a thin ring of light floating in the stark blackness. It’d be the last thing he ever saw, but that was fine. It disappeared when he tugged the door shut, completely plunging him into the dark. Not a single pinprick of light entered. 

He’d made it. He was safe in here. It was too late for everyone else, but the monsters would never get him. The dark was all the protection he needed. He found himself believing the same thing he rigidly lived by as a darkness fearing five year old: If he couldn’t see the creepy crawlies in the closet, they couldn’t see him. He giggled to himself as he imagined a frustrated monster pacing back and forth outside the furnace, snarling in annoyance, unable to find him. It was a hilarious thought, so funny it made him laugh hysterically. He laughed until tears streamed down his face. He’d perish within an hour, but not by their hands. They wouldn’t find him.

He was safe.


	8. Red Light

The cultists had dispersed to the woods again, but Jay was still splayed out in the same spot. He’d been savagely filleted open up to his sternum and his skin had a blueish tinge to it as most of the blood in his body had leaked out and formed a large crimson pool around him. Some of his organs, notably a section of his pancreas and several feet of intestine, were on the ground between his feet.

Sam stared at the visceral wound and gagged. One slice, that’s all it’d taken. The robed people weren’t immortal, but he was positive they weren’t entirely human either. No regular person, especially one of a slight build like the one who’d killed Jay, could’ve sliced through layers of muscle and organs so effortlessly. The nature of the murder suggested inhuman strength.

Casting a wary glance at the robed figures watching from outside the fence, he hesitantly approached the body and nudged it with the tip of his boot. Nothing happened. Taking that as a sign to continue, he crouched down, grabbed Jay’s right wrist and lifted his arm up. It was cold to the touch. He let it fall and it hit the ground with a wet smack. There was no movement, no reaction, absolutely nothing to suggest that Jay would get up and run off or mutate the second Sam turned around.

“He’s been dead for an hour and a half. If he was going to turn into one of those things it would’ve happened by now.” he said.

“Let’s burn him anyway.” Cameron lunged for a flamethrower, but Bailey yanked it away.

“We don’t have to.”

“So?”

“We don’t have to.” Bailey said again, this time in a warning tone.

“He’s right, Cam. Jay’s not going to turn.” Terry agreed.

“Don’t get preachy on me. None of you cared when I barbecued Eric.” Cameron argued.

“Eric was infected. He was coming back. He would’ve mutated like Pete. Jay’s just dead.” Bailey said.

Noah looked at the body, up at his colleagues and back again. A growing expression of worry spread across his face and he stammered the unnerving question that was building in his mind. “How do we know who’s infected?”

“What do you mean?” Waylon asked uneasily, subconsciously already knowing the answer.

“Jay died human, but Pete and Eric were infected. They changed. It’s like something was perfectly imitating them and we had no idea.” Noah ventured.

“Let me get this straight,” Bailey said. “You’re telling me that when I killed Pete, it wasn’t really him? He was some kind of... _thing?_ An imitation?”

“Yeah. He was a monster. We all saw what he turned into! He must have done something to Eric when he attacked him. Infected him, or replicated, or whatever those things do. Question is, what infected Pete?”

“Probably the same thing that summoned all these freaks!” Sam gestured to the cultists, silently and motionlessly observing the group’s crumbling dynamics. “All day I felt like something was watching me from the shadows. I thought I was being paranoid, but I was sensing those things. I just didn’t know it before. Whatever they are, they bided their time and waited until they could catch one of us alone. They got Pete and changed him. That man we saw in the basement wasn’t Pete. It was one of those things.”

Bailey’s blood turned to ice at Sam’s words. How had he not seen it before? Being alone. The things within the shadows, the same presence he’d initially detected hours ago, preyed upon those who were alone. They wouldn’t reveal themselves to a group, instead spreading paranoia and staying camouflaged until they were alone with their intended victim. They taunted him, made him aware of their maliciousness, but remained hidden as if to say _We could kill you right now, Bailey. We could take you over, infect you from the inside out and your oblivious friends won’t know it’s not really you until it’s too late. But we won’t. Not yet. Don’t you worry though, you’ll be one of us soon._

“We’ve _all_ been alone,” he said quietly. 

Heavy unease settled over the group. Hearing the words spoken out loud truly solidified the daunting fact that one or more of them could be infected. They’d all been alone at some point, and even a few minutes of unaccountability was enough to nourish their growing paranoia. They distanced themselves from each other, not wanting to be within striking distance of someone who may or may not be human. Hands clenched weapons tighter, nervous eyes flickered back and forth and all six of them shared the same unanimous thought. _Is the man next to me really who he says he is?_

“I’m still me,” Bailey spoke up again. He looked from face to face, only mildly comforted by the lack of volatile reactions. “And I know some of you are still human. If you were all these things, I’d be dead by now.”

“Think there’s a way to tell who’s infected and who’s not?” Terry asked hopefully. He had his gun ready just in case anyone made a sudden movement or grew extra appendages.

“I don’t know. Eric seemed fine, but fifteen minutes later he started to change.” Bailey felt hundreds of eyes upon him as he spoke and registered that the robed people were listening, taking in every word.

“One of us _is_ infected. I don’t know who, but I can sense it.” Cameron said almost absentmindedly. 

“What a load of shit! It’s probably you!” Terry accused. 

“Great,” Waylon clenched his jaw and gripped the nozzle of his flamethrower so hard he nearly broke it. It was starting. He realized he no longer knew any of the people in front of him. Even Terry was an untrustworthy stranger to him now. They’d all been alone, and they were all suspects. What if some of them were infected, hostile imitations just waiting for him to drop his guard? He wouldn’t. As horrifying as the thought of burning the others alive was, he was prepared to do it if he had to. If they attacked him, he’d torch them and wouldn’t think twice about it. But would they? Even if they were all infected, would they attack him outright or hold back, tricking him into thinking they were still human and lulling him into a false sense of security? 

Waylon’s vivid imagination took control and he graphically envisioned his demise. After deciding that the others were still human after all, he’d start walking back towards the building and hear a _splorrrrtch._ He’d whip around in a panic and see all five of them, faces cracking and splitting, spewing blood and slime while shambling towards him on too long multi jointed limbs. His flamethrower would sputter uselessly and the monsters would surround him. Their tentacles would invade every orifice. They’d slither down his throat, go up his ass and push into his eye sockets. Afterwards he would rise again as one of them.

A sudden outburst from Noah interrupted his morose thoughts.

“It’s him!” Noah screeched, pointing at Terry and singling him out. “It’s him! He was alone with Eric!”

Terry put his hands up defensively. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

Bailey visibly tensed. “You _were_ alone with Eric, Terry.”

“Yeah, for like ten minutes! He didn’t do anything to me.”

“Maybe it only takes ten seconds,” Cameron assumed. “You were alone with Eric, that makes you the prime suspect.”

“I didn’t know Eric was infected. I swear! I’m not what you think I am!” Terry tried to plead his case, but it was no use. He was officially public enemy number one. The others surrounded him on all sides, flanking him tightly so he couldn’t escape. He was the biggest and strongest out of all of them, but he wasn’t stupid enough to try and take all five at once, especially not with two guns and two flamethrowers aimed at him. 

Cameron was unarmed, yet at the moment Terry feared him far more than the others. He imagined Cameron leaping on him, knocking him down and viciously tearing his throat out with teeth that were a little too sharp.

The thought of firing a warning shot fleeted through Terry’s mind, but realized it would be a poor idea. Any unpredictable movement and he’d be pumped full of lead and set on fire before he pulled the trigger.

“Give me your gun. Stock end first.” Bailey commanded.

“Okay. It’s yours.” Terry slowly flipped the gun around so the barrel was pointing at his own face before handing it over. “Are...are you going to kill me?”

“Only if I have to. Hopefully it won’t come to that.” Bailey replied coldly. “Maybe there’s a way to tell who you really are.”

“You could shoot him in the head and see if he lives,” Cameron proposed.

“No.” Waylon interjected. “I’ve heard enough of your terrible ideas for one night.”

Terry looked incredibly relieved. “Thanks Lonnie.” Waylon only allowed a select few to address him as Lonnie without getting an ass chewing and Terry was one of those few. “I knew I could count on y-”

Waylon zoomed up to Terry and thrust a flamethrower barrel in his face. “I want to believe you. I really do. I’m praying that you’re still you. But right now, I don’t know who or what you are. You do anything stupid and I’ll light you up. Don’t think for a second that I won’t. Understand?”

Terry nodded.

“Good. Now turn around and start walking. We’re going back inside.” Waylon prodded him with the flamethrower to get him moving. “Keep going. Don’t even try to run off.”

“I’ll cover the rear,” Cameron offered. 

Bailey glared at him, immediately suspicious. Cameron was up to something, so he shut the situation down before a problem could arise.

“I don’t think so. Follow Waylon. I’ll cover the rear.” 

“If you insist,” Cameron said smugly.

That same cocky smirk Bailey was learning to hate was back on his face. He showed no fear, only arrogance and indifference, as if this was all a funny game to him.

Cameron was unpredictable and highly untrustworthy, and Bailey found himself fantasizing about putting a bullet between his eyes the next time he started running his mouth. He wouldn’t actually do it, but he wouldn’t be opposed to a limb shot if the situation called for it. Cameron was a threat, and it was only a matter of time before he hurt or even killed someone.

With a pistol in one hand and a flamethrower in the other, Bailey did a quick sweep of the area behind him to make sure no one was sneaking in.

The cultists watched him from outside the fence as he walked backwards with his weapons raised. Bailey got the impression that they could easily get in if they chose to but were stalling for time, waiting for something. He didn’t want to think about what that might be.

“What are you waiting for, you creepy fuckers? Come get me, I dare you!” Bailey challenged them. He tried to sound intimidating, but any imposing aura he might have had drained away when the horde moved as one, turning their heads up toward the watch tower. They were perfectly synchronized with each other, leading Bailey to think they were being controlled by something greater than themselves, just puppets for a higher being.

He backed up until he tripped against the steps, falling down ungracefully and lightly banging his head on a step. From his position sprawled out on the stairs, he could see the robed figures still staring at the tower. They all raised their gloved hands skyward, like they were praying or beckoning to the tower. Their knives gleamed in the moonlight. It creeped Bailey out and he wasn’t keen on finding out what they were doing. 

He scrambled to his feet and retreated back into the building, where Sam and Waylon had their weapons trained on Terry as Noah cut off a length of rope to tie his hands with. Cameron looked very amused.

“Hands behind your back.” Waylon bent Terry over the workbench and shoved him down. 

“You don’t have to be so rough!” Terry protested.

Noah slipped behind him, gripped his hands and tied his wrists together, binding the rope so tight it almost cut off his blood circulation.

“Let’s see you get out of that,” Noah said.

“You can’t treat me like this! I’m not infected!” Terry snarled at him.

“We don’t know that,” Bailey responded flatly. 

Anger won out over fear and Terry provoked the argument. “You assholes! Fuck all of you! You’re so convinced I’m infected, but what about you? I don’t know who any of you are anymore! Am I supposed to just trust you? Because I don’t!”

“I’d know if I was infected.” Cameron stated.

“That sounds like something an imitation would say. You’re the one who should be restrained, not me.” Terry scoffed.

“I agree, but that doesn’t mean I trust you,” Bailey said. “One way or another, we’ll find out who’s who.”

Sam suddenly appeared perplexed and walked towards the door. He peeked out the window. “Uhhh...guys?”

“What?” Bailey asked.

“Look outside. There’s red light coming from the tower.” 

_Red light._ Creeping dread washed over Bailey and he shuddered. He was reminded of his dream, of that unnatural red light shining through the office windows and the terrifying woman waiting for him within. Her dress, her shoes, her lips, her nails. All that same shade of deep, unfathomable red.

He didn’t want to look, but forced himself to. He had to confirm his fear.

The windows of the watch tower were glowing with that same bright, other worldly red light. It radiated outwards, giving the moon and the surrounding sky a slight scarlet hue. Down on the ground, the cultists stared up at the tower, their arms still outstretched towards it in a silent prayer.

“Infra-red. We’re seeing infra-red light,” Bailey said in disbelief.

He understood now. The watch tower was a beacon, and whatever was producing the red light was the signal calling the robed figures. It had a compelling power over all of them. Though he hadn’t realized it, he’d been under its spell since day one.

_Her_ spell. The woman in red. The light had always been there, invisible and inactive until she called it forth.

Bailey’s dream wasn’t the coincidence he’d earlier dismissed it as. It was a premonition, a warning of what was to come. She’d placed it inside his head, sending a message that he didn’t decipher until now.

Not only was she real, she was here. Omnipresent, watching them through the creatures in the shadows, through the cultists outside. She would ravage the group, having her underlings infect them and turn them against each other, and she wouldn’t stop until she had what she wanted. 

Him.


	9. Cameron flips his shit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally the beginning of this chapter contained a scene where they all go up to the tenth floor to see if the mahogany door is there (it's not) and while up there they realize that one of the flamethrowers has a hole in it and all the propane leaked out. I removed this scene because it felt like pointless filler, but I had to explain why they suddenly have only one flamethrower.

When they returned to the mezzanine, the door to the rec room was hanging wide open and Jeremy was nowhere in sight. There was no blood, nothing suspicious, no trace of a struggle. Jeremy had left on his own accord.

“He’s gone,” Bailey said, perplexed. 

Cameron slowly clapped in a false congratulation. “Nice one guys. That was some top notch security you employed. If I ever need some precious jewels guarded, you’ll be the first people I call.” he said sarcastically.

Bailey stepped up to him. “What the hell are you implying?” he asked angrily.

“I’m saying you’re a horrible security guard. Jeremy’s clearly infected, but instead of doing the right thing, killing him, you put him in a room he could easily get out of. This may come as a shock to you, Bailey. But he played you.” Cameron retorted.

“You can’t be sure he’s infected.” Waylon said. 

“Oh I’m sure. Come on guys, use your heads. What do you think made him so sick? Nobody can survive a fever that high, and nobody can throw up as much as he did without getting severely dehydrated. Don’t even get me started on the nonsense he was spouting. Three eyed people and purple light and shit. He’s obviously infected. I’m trying to protect you guys, why can’t you see that?”

“Some protector you are,” Terry rebuffed. “I’m not sure if you’ve noticed this, but three of us are dead! That’s a pretty shitty track record for someone who claims to be protecting us. We don’t need your help.”

“You’re wrong,” Cameron explained. “I’ve been given a gift, the ability to see inside you. I’ll know if you aren’t really you. And I’ll tell you this much. Jeremy isn’t the only one who’s been taken over. Someone in this room is being very... _dishonest_ with himself.”

Over by the mirror, Noah visibly tensed. 

“What do you mean?” Bailey interrogated. Cameron’s increasingly unusual behavior only solidified him at the top of his blacklist, and he wouldn’t be surprised if his abrasive colleague suddenly mutated into a repulsive tentacled beast. At the very least, he figured Cameron was assigning blame to take the suspicion off himself and splinter the group further.

“I get it. You don’t trust me. Why would you, right? Like it or not, you’ll to have to if you want to live. I can point out the impostor.” Cameron offered.

“Really? If that’s true, why didn’t you warn us about Pete and Eric?” Waylon questioned.

“Because at the time I couldn’t truly see. But now? I know. I _know_.”

“Are you guys hearing this shit?! Tell me you aren’t actually listening to him!” Noah said in disbelief. He began inching towards the door and his movement went unnoticed.

Cameron sighed. Calm on the surface but scathingly angry inside, his cool and nearly emotionless demeanor almost cracked.

“Looks like I’ll have to deal with this myself. _Again_. Sam, give me your gun.” he instructed. 

“No.” Sam stood his ground and gripped his shotgun tighter.

“Okay then.” Cameron said nonchalantly.

He lunged and punched Sam in the face, sending the small man to the floor with ease. The gun flew from Sam’s hand and he landed roughly on his back. Less than a second later, Cameron’s foot plowed into his stomach and he curled into himself, racked with pain. Cameron swiped his gun and kicked him again just to hear him moan.

“Cameron, stop!” Noah shouted at him.

Cameron whirled around and trailed the gun over his adversaries, then harshly stepped on Sam’s chest, shoving him back to the ground. “Against the wall! All of you! Now!”

Bailey reached for his weapon, but froze in his tracks when he found himself staring down the barrel of Sam’s shotgun. It was mere inches from his face, and there’d be no chance of escape if Cameron pulled the trigger. He’d be obliterated. Bailey occasionally liked to fantasize about being a badass action hero who saved innocent civilians in a hostage situation, but his real reaction was that of one of the petrified hostages, not the gun toting, one liner spitting special agent hero. He went rigid with terror, afraid to even blink. 

“Get your hands up where I can see them. Both of you!” Cameron ordered Bailey and Waylon to hold their hands up. “Go ahead hotshot, reach for your gun. I’ll shoot first. Let’s see you dodge a shotgun blast.”

Keeping his foot on Sam, he herded Bailey, Waylon, Noah and Terry to the opposite wall and grouped them close together so he could keep tabs on all of them at once.

From his position in the center of the room, Cameron could easily pick off anyone who made a run for it. He’d blow their heads off before they made it three feet. Nobody could escape without getting past him. He had all the power, and they had no choice but to comply as he stripped them of their weapons. It was for their own good. In his corrupted mind, he was their savior, but they didn’t see it. He couldn’t have the risk of being attacked while he exposed and dealt with the true threat.

But did it really matter? His original mission was to eliminate the threat and save the others, thus proving his innocence and re gaining their trust, but doubt wormed into his thoughts. They either didn’t want him back or they were too stupid to realize they needed his help to survive. Or perhaps it was petty jealousy? After everything he’d done for them, he was still a martyr in their eyes.

Holding them all hostage wasn’t his initial plan, but they forced his hand. Sam’s refusal to cooperate with his simple request pissed him off. Just about everything Sam had been doing--talking, breathing, _existing_ \-- pissed him off, and he entertained the idea of introducing the pint sized twat to the business end of his own shotgun. He had to stifle a giggle at the thought of Sam’s lifeless body rag dolling across the room from a close range blast to the chest. How funny that would be, especially if it made one of the others cry, vomit or shit himself. That would be funny too.

Cameron weighed his options. He’d warned them about Jeremy and had even taken care of Eric for them, yet they still treated him as if he was the monster. They’d made up their minds, that he was dangerous and couldn’t be trusted. Screw them. Why should he waste his time trying to save people who would never listen him? He could simply kill them all, find and finish off Jeremy, torch the robed lunatics outside, then call it a night and wait for the sun to come up.

“Fuck you, Cameron. You’re insane,” Bailey spat as Cameron swiped his gun off him.

The comment only amped up Cameron’s anger and he back handed Bailey across the face.

“No, fuck YOU, Bailey! You still don’t get it, and you’re going to feel really stupid when you realize just how wrong you are.” he thrust his gun at Bailey again, touching the cold barrel to his temple.

Bailey’s mouth went dry and his breath hitched in his throat as he recalled Cameron’s words from earlier. _Shoot him in the head and see if he lives._

“Don’t do this, Cam. Bailey’s not what you think he is. Please, listen to me.” Waylon tried to peacefully diffuse the situation, but Cameron wasn’t having it.

“I don’t have to listen to _anything_ you say, you fucking inbred hick! Shut up and be grateful I’m saving you from the real threat. NOAH!” Cameron shouted and abruptly aimed his gun at the young apprentice.

“What?! No! I-I’m not a monster!” Noah’s eyes widened behind his glasses and he raised his hands in a surrendering gesture. “Please Cam! Don’t shoot me!”

Cameron zeroed in on him. “We’ll need the flamethrower, because Noah’s going to mutate when I blow his brains out all over the wall. The rest of you guys will learn that the hard way.”

“Cameron, wait!” Terry piped up to get his attention, then lowered the tone of his voice to a calm passivity, as if he were speaking to a child. “Put the gun down, Cam. Think about what you’re doing. Just think about it, okay? You don’t want to hurt anybody.” He subtly worked at the rope around his wrists as he spoke.

“Fuck off, Terry.” Cameron didn’t even spare him a glance and fixated on Noah, who cowered before the gun.

“Please don’t kill me! I want to live!” Noah pleaded. He staggered, tripped over a rowing machine and scrambled backwards, but he had nowhere to go. Cameron towered over him and pressed the barrel of the gun to his forehead. Noah squeezed his eyes shut, grit his teeth together and turned his head away as if that would minimize the damage.

“No! Don’t kill him!” Bailey begged. He’d never felt so powerless in his life.

Cameron looked truly deranged. His hyper focused eyes gleamed with sadistic intent, his tongue ran over his teeth in a grotesque, almost sexual nature and several strands of his usually slicked back hair hung in front of his face. He wouldn’t merely shoot Noah, he was going to toy with him first. He’d savor the execution and make the others watch.

“Listen to him!” Sam shouted from the ground. His right nostril was bleeding heavily and he squirmed under the crushing weight of Cameron’s foot. “Noah’s just a kid! For God’s sake Cam, you have a son of your own! How can you threaten to kill someone else’s?”

“Because he’s not my kid. He’s not even human.” Cameron stated in a voice that was disturbingly calm. “Oh and Terry? I see what you’re doing. You’re trying to escape.”

Terry startled, like he was expecting everyone else to attack him for trying to slip out of his bonds. “No, I’m n-”

A deafening blast rocked through the room as Cameron suddenly shot the mirror on the wall, sending glistening shards of glass exploding outwards. Hundreds of razor edged fragments, some brick sized, others smaller than a grain of sand, lashed at exposed skin and poked through clothing, gouging flesh beneath. Bailey yelped as a large chunk stabbed into his left shoulder blade, and Waylon fell painfully to his knees, chunks of glass getting lodged in them. They writhed on the floor, trying to escape the glass but only injuring themselves further. Streaks of blood smeared across the white linoleum floor with every movement.

Cameron didn’t seem to notice the crystalline slivers stuck in his arm and turned back to his target. Noah hadn’t moved. He sat against the wall and wore an expression of dissociative vacancy, completely unresponsive to Cameron or the large shard of bloodstained glass sticking out of his right arm. Many smaller pieces were tangled in his long hair.

“Time to expose what you really are.” Cameron said and prepared to fire.

Terry quickly rolled onto his side and mule kicked Cameron in the the knee, hobbling him and knocking him down right as he pulled the trigger.

One of the overhead florescent lights shattered from the shot and fine glass shards rained down onto Cameron’s head and shoulders. He managed to protect his eyes, but tiny bits of glass pricked and sliced at his face and neck.

Snarling with fury, he sat up and pointed the gun at Noah once more, only for Sam to crack him across the face and punch him right in the eye. Cameron reeled back from the impact, and it was enough to give Sam a chance. They grappled for the gun and another shot went off, missing Terry by a meter and taking out a chunk of the concrete wall instead. It flew out of Cameron’s hand and skidded several yards across the floor before coming to a stop by a rack of weights.

“You fucking asshole! You’ll pay for that!” Cameron saw red. He hit Sam again, then flipped over and started crawling towards the gun. Sharp triangles of glass sliced up the palms of his hands, but he barely registered the pain. He’d had enough. Noah could wait a minute, but Sam needed to be wiped off the face of the earth. If anyone else uttered even one peep of protest, he’d kill them too.

Terry rose to his feet and frantically tugged at the ropes around his wrists. They were slightly loose, but he doubted he’d be able to get his hands free in time. He had about ten seconds at most before Cameron got to the gun and shot them all. Frantically working his mind for a solution, his gaze landed on Noah, who was still rooted to the same spot.

“Noah, untie me! Please. Cameron’s going to kill us all!” 

Noah ignored him and blankly stared ahead.

Sam got back up and ran at Cameron, stomping on his hand just as he reached for the gun. The bones in Cameron’s right pinky finger shattered with a muffled crunch. He was too focused on murdering his colleagues to react to the pain, but he didn’t take kindly to his assassination attempt being botched.

“You fucker! I’ll kill you!” he roared. He sprang, grabbed Sam by the neck, slammed him down and pinned him on the ground. He squeezed with all his strength, smiling sadistically as he crushed Sam’s trachea. 

Sam lashed out and struck Cameron but it wasn’t enough. He choked and gasped for air, completely overwhelmed with panic. His mind went haywire, and his vision was consumed by Cameron’s rabid, animalistic face. 

Less than twenty seconds had passed since Cameron shot the glass, but to Sam, time was at a stand still. The hands around his neck clamped down with unbreakable strength, cutting off his air supply. He clawed at Cameron’s hands, but there was no force behind it; his will to fight back was rapidly fading away. His head felt heavy, and he became lightheaded and disorientated as he slipped closer to unconsciousness. Raspy gurgling sounds came from his throat. 

Cameron relished the ragged sound of his victim trying to breathe. Sam’s face twisted into absolute panic, tears leaked from the corners of widened eyes, his mouth gaping open. It was a good look for him. Cameron wished Sam looked like that all the time.

Sam choked out a strained gasp. It’d be one of his last, Cameron would make sure of it. Nobody would come to his rescue no matter how badly they wanted to. Sam would be dead before Bailey and Waylon crossed the glass strewn floor, Noah the imitation simply sat there waiting to be bathed in flames, and that useless buffoon Terry was in no position to do anything. This would be easy.

Desperate to save Sam’s life, Terry again demanded to be untied. “Untie me, Noah! Right now!” 

Noah snapped out of his catatonic trance and quickly stood up. He shot a terrified glance at Cameron, cast an apologetic one at Terry and bolted out of the room. He grabbed the flamethrower and sprinted away, vanishing beyond the bend. 

“Noah, wait!” Bailey called after him but it was too late. He was already gone.

The rope around Terry’s wrists loosened, and he looked behind him to see Waylon working at the knot.

“I got you, now you get him!” Waylon said as the rope slid to the floor.

“Thanks.” Terry said curtly. 

He charged at Cameron, violently yanked him off Sam and threw him to the floor. Terry worked his fist into Cameron’s hair, roughly jerked his head back and dragged him over to a nearby cabinet.

Cameron flailed in Terry’s grip. “Let go of me, you cocksucker!”

Terry pulled him into a standing position and slammed his head into the cabinet doors. He drew back and smashed Cameron’s head into the cabinet a second time, but ceased his attack and let go when he saw the splatter of blood it left behind. 

Thin rivulets of blood streamed down Cameron’s face from the gash on his forehead. He brought his hand up to the wound and tottered unsteadily towards the center of the room in a dazed zigzag pattern.

“Oh....oh god,” he said quietly. Every shred of homicidal intent vanished from his voice. His eyes rolled back and he crumpled into a motionless heap on the floor. 

Terry blanched. “Did I just....?”

“I fucking hope so,” Sam croaked out between coughs and gasps. He was on his side, clutching at his throat where a pair of purple handprint shaped bruises were already beginning to form.

Waylon limped over to him. Several pieces of glass had buried themselves in his swollen left knee, saturating the leg of his jeans with dark blood.

“Are you okay, Sam?” he asked.

“No, Waylon. I’m not okay. I’m really not.” Sam coughed and massaged his crushed throat. He paused for a minute before speaking again. “I was almost murdered for the second time tonight. I want my gun. Right now.”

Bailey crawled to it and slid it over to him.

“What are we going to do about Cameron?” he asked, wincing as he pulled a hunk of glass out of his arm.

Cameron groaned and cradled his bleeding head in his hands.

“I’ll tie him up.” Terry volunteered. He picked up the discarded ropes, crouched beside the barely conscious man, rolled him over and tightly tied his hands behind his back. After Cameron’s hands were bound, Terry repossessed the two handguns and turned them over to Bailey.

“Tie his feet too, I’m not taking any chances.” Bailey said.

Once Cameron was hogtied and passed out, Terry ambled over to Waylon and sat next to him.

“We’ve got to get that glass out of your knee. It’ll get infected.”

“How are you going to get it out?” Waylon asked in a small voice. He was visibly nervous. He could deal with other people’s wounds no problem, but he was surprisingly squeamish when his own blood was being spilled.

“I’ll just grab it and yank it out.” Terry replied.

“Oh, okay then,” Waylon paled. He cringed as the fabric of his pants was rolled up over his swollen, lacerated kneecap. A couple hunks of glass jutted out from his skin. They were embedded deep, but there was still enough glass sticking out to grab onto.

“Ready?” Terry asked.

“Not really. Just get it over with,” Waylon said feebly.

He shuddered and turned away as Terry pried at the first piece. Pain shot through his leg and he chomped down on his balled up fist to prevent himself from shouting. It felt like someone had injected hydrochloric acid into his veins. Fresh blood oozed from the wound once the dagger of glass was removed.

“One down.” Terry stated.

Waylon tried to distract himself by counting how many weights were on the nearby weight rack as the other shards were unearthed from inside his knee. It hurt, but it was the sensation of foreign objects squelching as they were pulled out of his leg that made him shiver with disgust. 

After what seemed like an eternity, the glass fragments had all been removed and placed in a small bloody pile at his side.

Terry swiped a clean white rag and snugly bound it around Waylon’s knee. 

“Still think I’m infected?” he inquired.

“I don’t know what I think,” Waylon admitted.

“I’ll take that. Can you walk?”

“I think so. It’ll hurt like hell but I can’t just sit here and let those things get me.”

Waylon stood up and propped himself against the wall. 

Bailey approached him and handed his gun back to him.

“Noah ran away and took the flamethrower. I’ve got to go after him.” he said.

“By yourself? No way. I’m coming with you.” Terry objected.

Bailey briefly considered rejecting the offer, but he figured Terry wouldn’t have saved Sam’s life if he was infected. He didn’t fully trust anyone, but it was entirely possible that none of them were infected and Cameron was trying to start a fear campaign.

“Trust is a hard thing to come by these days, but I swear I’m not infected. I’m still me, Bailey.” Terry said.

Waylon cracked a smile. “I made up my mind. Take him with you, Bailey.”

“Okay. But I’m keeping the gun just in case.” Bailey replied.

“We’ll watch this asshole,” Sam said, referring to Cameron, who was still unconscious. “Hopefully he’s in a coma.”

“Here’s the plan. Terry and I will find Noah and bring him back here. In fifteen minutes we’ll all meet upstairs. If we don’t show, come looking for us but keep your guard up. If you see Jeremy and we aren’t with him, knock his ass out and tie him up with Cameron.” Bailey proposed.

“Sounds good,” Waylon said. 

When Bailey and Terry stepped out into the mezzanine, the air was thick and fetid with a smokey, metallic aroma.

“Something’s burning,” Terry remarked, immediately becoming alarmed. “Noah better not be planning to burn this place down with all of us still inside!”

“If he is, we’ve got to find him fast.” Bailey said.

He scanned his surroundings, looking for clues to his friend’s whereabouts. 

“There!” he pointed at a charred, smoldering wooden cart loaded with a bundle of singed metal conduit. “He’s got to be around here somewhere.”

Footsteps drifted down from the main floor, followed by the clunk of the flamethrower being set down.

“Upstairs,” Bailey said. He silently stalked up the steps and crept towards the source of the sound.

Noah was standing by a pipe threader, looking around anxiously and rapidly clenching his hands. He was clearly scared, and Bailey figured he was having a panic attack. The flamethrower was on the ground by his feet.

“Wait here,” Bailey signaled to Terry. “He’s completely freaked out. I think it’d be best if I’m the one to talk to him. I can probably calm him down.”

“Alright. I’ll keep my eye out. If I see flames I’ll come running.” Terry said. 

Bailey nodded and slunk out of concealment. He disengaged the safety on his gun and prayed he wouldn’t have to use it.

“Noah?” he asked.

Noah flinched in surprise and picked up the flamethrower in a crazed frenzy. He tensed, ready to run at any second.

“Stay away from me!”

“It’s okay. It’s just me. Cameron’s tied up and unconscious, he can’t hurt you.” Bailey assured.

“Yes he can. You all can!” Noah said.

“We won’t. Come back with me, everything will be fine.” Bailey took several steps forward only for Noah to snap up and point the flamethrower at him.

“That’s close enough! You just want to get me alone! I know what you’re up to! I’m not stupid, Bailey. Take one more step and I’ll kill you. I’ll burn you alive!” Noah threatened. A small wisp of fire danced on the end of the flamethrower.

Bailey blinked in stunned shock. A lump formed in his throat and he suddenly felt like crying. He’d somehow managed not to have an emotional meltdown despite killing his boss in self defense and witnessing two people mutating into unearthly monsters, but hearing Noah, his best friend, greet him with such hostility and distrust was the thing that finally broke him. This wasn’t a nightmare he’d wake up from. It was happening and it was real.

“I..I’m not infected. It’s me, Noah. Please, you’ve got to believe me.” Bailey tried to explain but did a poor job of it.

“I don’t.” Noah said frigidly. Underneath his defensive, paranoid and quite possibly murderous attitude, there was a layer of sorrow and regret, like there was a minuscule fragment of him that still believed Bailey was human but couldn’t afford to take a chance on it.

Keeping his weapon trained on Bailey, he walked backwards several yards towards the plant’s elevator. Without looking behind him, he pressed the call button with his left hand.

“If you try and follow me, you’re dead. I mean it.” 

The elevator softly chimed and the doors creaked open. Noah backed in, still brandishing the flamethrower at Bailey.

“But...we’re friends.” Bailey stammered. He couldn’t take hearing those words from Noah of all people.

“No, we’re not.” Noah wavered. His voice threatened to break. “I don’t know what you are, Bailey. But you’re not my friend. Not anymore.”

The elevator doors slid shut, leaving Bailey alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You may also be wondering, "Wait a minute, wasn't the elevator broken earlier?" Yes, it was. It's working now because the building wants it to. The power plant itself is kind of 'alive' in a sense, and it'll become more apparent as the story goes on.


	10. Beyond The Fence

The elevator took Noah up to the tenth floor.

It was even more foreboding than it had been before. Undulating shadows swam over the walls and darkness permeated. The floor’s few incandescent lights, becoming dimmer by the hour, struggled to illuminate the growing blackness.

The silence was what unnerved him most. It was too quiet. He could almost hear his own heartbeat as he crept defensively towards the staircase, flamethrower raised in case anything suddenly jumped out at him.

Coming up here was a bad idea, but it did give him a minute to gather his thoughts. _They_ were probably scouting for him. He suspected one or two of them might still be human, but he wasn’t sure and couldn’t chance trusting anybody. Not like the uninfected would last long. They’d either be assimilated or get murdered by Cameron.

Noah tried not to think about Bailey, but he did and it hurt. Just last night the two of them had busted out Noah’s Nintendo 64 and played some old school Mario Kart. Eight hours ago they’d been goofing off, eating pizza and teasing each other during lunch break. He’d pictured their friendship lasting for life. Bailey would be Noah’s best man when he got married, they’d throw Super Bowl parties together at middle age and rant to each other about neighbors playing loud music when they were old and decrepit. Yet it was undone in less than a day. Five years of seemingly indestructible friendship, destroyed in the span of three hours. 

The thing downstairs looked, acted and sounded just like Bailey, an imitation so perfect and convincing there was no way to physically expose it for what it was. Noah didn’t know when the change had occurred, but his friend was gone, replaced by some kind of body stealing parasite. There was no cure, no way to get him back. 

Noah pushed up his glasses and swiped at his eyes before giving himself a pep talk.

“Focus, Noah. Focus. Bailey looks alive, but he’s dead and gone. You can grieve later, but you’ve got to get out of here first. You’re alone, Noah. You are _alone_.”

Weakly burning lights guided him to the stairs. He stopped at the top step and froze.

No, he was wrong. He wasn’t alone. 

Something was up here with him. For a minute he stood motionless at the top of the steps, finger on the trigger of his flamethrower, ready to incinerate anything that moved. Nothing did. He sensed another presence, yet it didn’t attack. It stayed hidden.

His eye was drawn to the row of furnaces. The one on the far end piqued both fear and curiosity. 

Keeping his guard up, he tiptoed over to the large structure. Its heavy circular door was shut, but the yellowish light shining down on it highlighted an area around the handle where the thick layer of dust had been wiped away. A partial handprint was visible and Noah instantly knew something was in there.

Not wanting to know what it was, he turned away from it.

He nearly went into cardiac arrest when a knock sounded from inside the furnace. Coming in clusters of three, the knuckles of a probably monstrous hand rapped against the interior of the door. 

Noah paused. It wasn’t chaotic or unsynchronized. There was something so deliberate and _human_ about it. Desperate. A signal for help.

It had to be a trap.

“Face your fear, Noah. You’ve got a flamethrower. It doesn’t.” Noah challenged himself.

No more running away. It was time to be brave. If he didn’t kill the monster in the furnace, it would come after him. He’d walk away and hear the door slowly creak open behind him, then whatever was inside would pounce on him before he had a chance to turn around. 

The echoing knocks ceased almost as abruptly as they began.

Wielding the flamethrower with his right hand, Noah nervously reached towards the door handle. He inhaled deeply, counted backwards from three and yanked the door open.

No attack came. The shape inside flinched away from the glowing orange flame and shielded its face.

Noah stepped back in surprise. “Holy shit. Jeremy, you’re alive.”

“I’m safe in here. Safe.” Jeremy was slumped against the rim of the furnace interior. His face and clothes were streaked with ancient black soot, and his eyes were unfocused, like he didn’t recognize who he was talking to.

“Why are you in there?” Noah asked. He’d unleash a plume of fire if he detected anything amiss about his colleague.

“He can’t get me in here,” Jeremy said cryptically. 

“Who can’t?”

Jeremy’s gaze landed on Noah’s weapon. “Is that a flamethrower?” he asked with childlike curiosity.

“Yeah. Pretty handy against those things. It was Bailey’s idea.” Noah said. Sadness was evident in his voice but Jeremy thankfully didn’t notice. 

“Where are the others?”

Noah ignored the question and changed the subject. “Jeremy, why did you leave the rec room?”

“Because I got scared. It wasn’t safe in there. I heard weird sounds in the basement, so I ran away.” Jeremy admitted.

“Me too.” Noah replied. “I didn’t know what else to do. I don’t trust the others anymore.”

“Do you trust me?” Jeremy asked.

“Yeah.” Noah lowered his weapon. If Jeremy was infected, he would’ve made his move already. He crouched down so they were face to face.

“Things have gotten really bad. It’s just you and me.”

“They’re all dead?” 

“Dead or infected. Cameron’s gone crazy. He tried to kill me! Almost blew my head off! But we’re getting out of here. I’ve got enough fuel to burn a path through those cultists outside. Come on out. You should be alright as long as you stay behind me.”

Jeremy retreated back into the furnace. “But I’m safe in here. The monsters can’t get me. This is my hiding place. It... healed me. I came in here to die in peace, but I’m still alive and starting to feel better. As long as I stay in here, I’ll be okay.”

Noah almost dismissed it as nonsense, but thought better of it. Last time he saw Jeremy, he’d been delirious and barely conscious with an absurdly high fever, but now he was coherent and much more alert. If the furnace really was a magical safe zone with healing properties, he wanted in. He considered asking Jeremy if it had room for two, but it was up to him to get help.

“I’ll get help. I’m going to make a run for it and climb the fence. Then I’ll be back with the police, the military and special forces. Enough heavy artillery and this nightmare will be over.” Noah said confidently.

“Don’t die on me, Noah.” Jeremy said.

“I won’t. I promise.”

***************************************************

Garbled voices roused Cameron from unconsciousness. Pain blossomed across his forehead and his eyelashes were crusted together with dried blood. He peeled his eyes open only to be greeted with the barrel of a shotgun. It was mere centimeters from his face, but it neither surprised nor scared him. At most, it was a small annoyance. The ropes tightly binding his wrists and ankles together were a much bigger problem.

“Don’t move.” Sam’s voice was thick with malice. The large hand shaped bruise on his throat had turned a deep shade of blueish purple and Cameron was surprised he could talk at all.

“Where would I go, Sam? I’m tied up.” 

“Don’t you fucking sass me, asshole. Make any sudden movements and I’ll-”

“Yeah, sure.” Cameron interrupted dismissively. He wasn’t worried. Sam was all bark and no bite, he wouldn’t pull the trigger.

“Oh good. He lives,” Waylon said with obvious disdain.

No one bothered to hide their dismay, but their opinions were irrelevant to Cameron. The four men staring at him were expendable. They could all get maimed beyond recognition and he wouldn’t shed a tear. His own safety was the only thing that mattered and as long as Noah was prowling around, he was in just as much danger as everyone else. 

Cameron almost respected the creatures. Much like him, they chose to lurk in the background, observe from a distance and reveal themselves only when the situation called for it. They were intelligent and cunning, just like Cameron himself. He almost prided the Noah-thing for stealing the flamethrower. It had seen two of its brethren roasted by flames, so it retaliated by taking away the one thing its prey knew would kill it. Playing the part of a scared victim was a nice touch too. If he was a betting man, Cameron would’ve gambled his life savings on none of his idiotic co workers seeing through the creature’s facade. 

Cameron noticed Bailey leaning against the wall with his arms crossed and eyes cast downwards. He was visibly upset.

“The truth hurts, doesn’t it Bailey?” he asked. “I tried to tell you. Noah’s infected. I saw it then, I still see it now.”

Bailey didn’t react, but Terry did.

“Not that crap again! You’re full of shit, Cameron! You don’t have any special gift, you just wanted to kill someone! Admit it! If I didn’t know better I’d say you’re the one leading those psychos outside!” Terry shouted at him.

Cameron continued, undeterred. “You know what your problem is, Terry? You’re too nice. You’re the kind of guy who helps blind old ladies across the street. The guy who takes in stray dogs and gives money to the poor. That’s why you’re going to die tonight. Nice guys finish last, Terry. Don’t you know that? Sooner or later you’re going to help someone who doesn’t need it and it’ll cost you your life.”

Terry snorted. “Take him to the crazy house, he’s officially lost it.”

He regrouped with the others. They conversed in hushed tones, but Cameron was able to pick out a few words, one of which was _watch tower_. The subject soon shifted to Cameron’s fate, and with the change raised their voices so he could hear them.

“Leave him. He’s not going anywhere.” Waylon said matter of factly. 

They headed for the door.

“You know I’m right,” Cameron called after them.

Bailey responded by slamming the door shut behind him as he left.

Cameron smiled and quietly laughed to himself. He figured Bailey, Terry, Waylon and Sam had, at most, two brain cells between them as they’d done the one thing they absolutely shouldn’t have under any circumstance: leaving him alone.

He rolled onto his side and prepared himself. As a child he’d been unusually flexible, to the point where he’d joke about joining the circus and freak out his friends by scuttling about on all fours while bent in half. Unlike most people, he never lost those abilities to age. Even now at forty, he could still nearly fold himself in half with only minimal pain. His hands were tightly tied behind his back, so he drew his knees to his chest and maneuvered his arms down and over his legs. Success. Now with his tied hands in front of him, he worked at the rope around his ankles. A moment later it loosened and fell away. He scanned the room for something to cut through the last rope. The big shards of glass had been cleaned up and disposed of elsewhere, but a bright gleam caught his eye.

Half hidden underneath one of the treadmills was a large triangle of glass that had been missed. 

He snatched it up, clamped it between his feet and began sawing the rope over it. Several fibers snapped with each pass. Soon the glass cut completely through the rope and Cameron was free.

He tossed the glass away, stood up and calmly walked out the door.

********************************************

Their robes ignited immediately, engulfing the figures within a burning orange blaze. They flailed and thrashed, but didn’t scream and succumbed to the fire in silence.

Noah swept the flamethrower left to right in a wide arc, catching more cultists in the stream of fire. He’d burn them all if he had the fuel to do so, but he’d killed enough of them to clear an escape path. Those still living wisely backed away.

He’d scared them off, now he just had to get over the fence and he’d be in the clear. He bolted towards it and dropped the flame thrower at his feet. Getting it over the fence wasn’t feasible, so he had no choice but to leave it. Now that he was unarmed, the cultists began to approach again. Thinking quickly, Noah climbed onto the hood of Sam’s truck, leapt on top of the card reading station, scaled the nearby light pole and catapulted himself over the fence.

He landed gracefully on his feet. _That was surprisingly easy,_ he thought to himself. _I must have been a cat in my previous life._

The cultists didn’t make any moves to stop him. They only stared through the iron bars. Noah wondered what they were thinking. Were they mad at him? Did they not care? He didn’t give it another thought and took off running. He wouldn’t stop until he got help and was safe with the police.

Freshly fallen leaves crunched under his feet and a thin branch whipped him in the face, but he didn’t slow down. He’d never been much of an athlete and started to feel winded after thirty seconds, but he refused to stop. His thoughts raced.

_Keep going and do NOT stop until you reach the highway. Run to the first person you see, call the p-- holy fucking shit I just killed like twenty people-- call the police and have them come back for Jeremy. It’s too late for the others. I don’t care how tired you are. Keep running._

It was nearly two miles to the highway, and he had a mile and three quarters to go. He began panting heavily and involuntarily slowed down. Cursing his lack of stamina, he stopped and caught his breath.

A bright beam of light sliced through the trees up ahead. With it came voices. It sounded like a man and a woman, though Noah couldn’t be sure. His eyes adjusted to the dark and he made out the shape of two people walking towards him about a hundred yards ahead. One of them held a flashlight. The road forked near a swampy pond and branched off to a smaller back road that was primarily used as a walking trail and bicycle route. The light veered towards the left and the couple changed course. They hadn’t seen him.

Noah sprinted towards the couple, screaming and shouting to get their attention.

“Hey! Help me! Please! Call 911!”

The couple didn’t notice him. He shouted as loud as he possibly could, but they ambled on, blissfully ignorant of his pleas. Were these people deaf? How could they not hear him? 

“Stop! Don’t leave me, I need help!” Noah’s throat was starting to ache from yelling so much.

The flashlight’s beam was consumed by the night as Noah approached the intersection. He tore down the road in pursuit of the couple and caught a glimpse of them as they disappeared around the bend. A middle aged couple. They should have heard him. Though he was about to drop from exhaustion, he pushed himself to run faster. He couldn’t lose them, not when help was so close. He ran around the bend and suddenly froze in his tracks, floored with shock and disbelief.

He was back at Callahan, trapped inside the fence.

***

Rebecca Fellbrooks tugged her thin light blue sweatshirt tighter around her shoulders. It was a pleasant autumn night, hovering around fifty degrees, but to her it felt unusually chilly. She wasn’t sure if it was the perceived cold or the odd noise she just heard, but she shivered slightly.

“You cold?” her husband Steven aimed his flashlight slightly to the right, illuminating the path ahead.

“A little, yeah. I should have brought my thicker sweatshirt.” she replied.

“Here,” Steven shrugged his sweatshirt off and handed it to her. She gladly accepted and put it on. It helped.

It was about nine at night, but strangely there was no ambient noise, no other life besides them. The Fellbrooks often took night walks on the area’s many trails and there was always the chitter of small nocturnal animals. Occasionally they’d see deer elegantly bounding through the surrounding woods. It was relaxing just knowing there were many other living creatures nearby.

Tonight there was only silence. Rebecca hadn’t heard a single frog croak or one squirrel scamper through the trees in over fifteen minutes. The area was a dead zone. The only sound besides their own footsteps and the soft creaking of branches was one she wasn’t even sure she’d heard, a noise like a wounded animal crying out in the distance. Steven hadn’t noticed it, and she wasn’t certain of it herself.

“Sure is quiet out here tonight,” Steven commented. 

“Yeah. We’re near the power plant. Maybe the animals don’t like it?” Rebecca said.

“It could be the chemicals. Back in the day that place was a coal burning plant, and I heard they used to dispose of waste the shady way. You know, bury it while the plant owner turned a blind eye. I’ll bet that’s what keeps the animals away. Toxins in the ground and such.”

“Makes sense.”

Rebecca tutted at the thought of people knowingly dumping hazardous waste in the forest, feeling slightly hypocritical as she did so. She’d become more eco friendly as she got older, but in her youth she’d flicked countless cigarette butts into nature without a care.

The two of them walked on. In less than a block the path would take them past the power plant, then lead to a pedestrian bridge that crossed the river.

Rebecca looked upwards at the plant’s watch tower, barely visible against the pitch black sky. If not for the rows of glowing lights adorning it, she might not have seen it at all. She frowned and looked away from it. The tower had always given her the creeps, even in broad daylight, but at night it seemed far more sinister, like it was harboring a terrible secret and inviting her to investigate. The small overactive part of Rebecca’s mind pictured the tower haunted by vengeful spirits, broadcasting otherworldly signals and beckoning in new victims.

It was a truly absurd thought. She was a logical, fact based woman. As much as she liked haunted house movies, she knew ghosts weren’t real. For every seemingly supernatural occurrence, there was always a scientific explanation. No exceptions. The weird noise she’d heard was an animal.

She’d almost forgotten about it when she heard it again, slightly louder this time. It made her pause. When it came a third time, it became clearer. It wasn’t an animal at all.

It was a person.

***

“This isn’t happening. I was out. I was out!” Noah glanced around in disorientated panic. “It’s not possible!”

The smoldering corpses of the cultists still lay where he left them, confirming that his escape hadn’t been imaginary. He’d gotten out, but reality bent and the woods themselves shifted, bringing him back within the confines of the fence. It was as if he was trapped in a parallel universe, one that existed only within the power plant’s fenced border, completely cut off from the rest of the world.

That’s why the cultists hadn’t cared when he jumped the fence. There was no escape, no way out. It didn’t matter which way he ran, every path would lead straight back to the power plant.

The yard was different now. Wide cones of light, cast from the exterior lamps and tinted orange from the watch tower’s red glow, struck vehicles, equipment and crates. Beyond them distorted black shadows seemed to bend and flow like water. The cultists had slunk away once again, but Noah could still feel their presence. He noticed with unease that the flamethrower was gone. The robed people, or rather, robed _things_ \--no way were they human-- had likely taken it during their most recent disappearing act. 

Noah immediately became hyper aware. The things were hiding, but they were watching. He felt their unseen eyes burning into him, waiting to see what he’d do. A wave of panic hit him upon noticing another prominent change in the environment. 

Something long and skinny was coming out of Jay’s corpse.

Noah’s heart leapt into his throat. One of those monsters was about to reanimate right in front of him and he had nothing to defend himself with. All he had on him was his dead phone. He was about to flee in terror, but stopped when he got a better look at the scene. The object coming out of Jay wasn’t organic. It was his rifle.

The gun stuck out of his body at a forty five degree angle, the barrel lodged underneath his ribcage. An ammo box sat in his hand.

The cultists were playing with him. Not only had they allowed him to think he’d escaped, they’d rearranged Jay’s body as a grotesque fuck you, presenting him with a dead man’s gun.

Noah wasn’t expecting it to be loaded. He didn’t know how to use a gun, but if he could use it as a blunt weapon it’d be better than nothing. Cautiously he crept over to the body and pried at the gun. It came loose with a wet squish and he shuddered with revulsion. His knowledge of firearms was limited to the extremely basic: pull the trigger to fire. He knew there was a safety somewhere, but had no clue where it was, how to reload or how to check the ammo stock. Last week Jay had droned on to him about various types of rifles, and now he was kicking himself for not paying attention.

Movement in the shadows put him on high alert and he raised the rifle. He’d have a small chance of getting away if he could bluff his way through. If he could last until sunrise, he might live to see another day. Reality shifting be damned. He refused to give up that easily.

A long shadow breached the light behind him, and the arm of the rapidly approaching silhouette raised.

Noah whipped around without aiming and pulled the trigger.

***

“Steven, tell me you heard that.” 

There was no more doubt. Someone nearby needed help. Rebecca was sure of it. What she’d initially mistaken for cries of a hurt animal began to sound more and more like words, and then she’d heard the gunshot. It was oddly muted, but it was a sound she immediately recognized.

“I heard it alright. Someone shot a rifle, but hunting season hasn’t started yet.” Steven said. “Plus you can’t hunt in this area. It’s too close to residential neighborhoods.”

“Why would there be just one gunshot?” Rebecca asked. It unnerved her.

“If it’d been from a handgun or a shotgun, I’d guess a drug deal had just gone bad. But if you want to shoot a man at close range, you wouldn’t use a rifle. It’s probably some drunk jackass hunting out of season.” Steven rationalized.

On the surface, Rebecca accepted that answer even though her instinct said her husband was wrong.

They were in front of Callahan’s entry gate now.

Rebecca approached the gate and grabbed the cool metal bars. Steven joined her and aimed his flashlight around.

The dark yard was bathed in soft moonlight, giving it a tranquil aura. A gentle breeze blew through, slightly catching the sparse areas of grass scattered around the yard. There was nothing strange or threatening, and everything looked just as it should. 

It was quiet, serene and almost peaceful, but Rebecca couldn’t shake the feeling that something just beyond the gate was very wrong.

***

The cultist’s blade clattered to the ground, but Noah didn’t have time to pick it up. He’d shot the figure in the shoulder, but they kept coming. More of them slunk out of the darkness, almost like they were spawning from within the shadows themselves. They extended their knives and stalked towards him at a brisk pace.

Noah couldn’t win this. He turned and ran back towards the gate. This time he wouldn’t run too far once he got over. He’d stay close and hide in a tree until sunrise. Time appeared to be passing normally, so the sun had to come up at some point. When it did, there would be people around and he could get help.

A narrow beam of light suddenly sliced through the dark, catching Noah’s attention immediately.

Two figures stood on the other side of the gate. It was the same couple he saw earlier. A brunette woman wearing two sweatshirts and a man with glasses and thinning hair. Both of them looked to be in their fifties, and they seemed to be searching for something.

Noah almost cried with relief. They’d heard him after all. He was saved. Once he got over the fence, he’d be safe. He’d call the police, get hundreds of guys with guns out here and end the nightmare.

“Help! Please! There are things in here with me!” he shouted as he sprinted towards the gate. “They’re going to kill me!”

Oddly, the couple didn’t react. The man shone his flashlight around but didn’t notice him.

“Help me!” 

Noah was only a few feet from the gate, yet the people on the other side acted like he wasn’t there. Why weren’t they helping? The woman was looking directly at him, but didn’t acknowledge his presence. Then the terrifying, paralyzing realization hit him.

They couldn’t see or hear him.

He was mere inches from help, but his saviors didn’t see him. They were in the real world, unaware of the danger he was in. To them, everything looked normal and in a few seconds they’d turn away after deciding that nothing was wrong.

“See? No one’s there.” the man turned around. 

The woman spared one quick glance before she too turned her back to the gate. 

“No! Come back! Come back!” Noah pleaded. He lunged at the gate and reached through the bars, clawing at the air in a desperate attempt to snag their clothing. His fingers fell short by less than an inch.

He was so worked up he didn’t notice the rapid movement in his peripheral vision.

Someone ambushed him from behind and his sight went black as a sack was pulled over his head. Rough hands tore at him and shoved him forward. He blindly lashed out with the rifle, but it was ripped from his grip and his assailant harshly cracked him over the head, staggering him. Half conscious, he fell against a nearby vehicle and slumped to the ground. He tried to fight back, but his limbs wouldn’t cooperate. He was fading fast. 

Noah’s attacker grabbed his ankles and dragged him back towards the power plant.

*****************************

Jeremy nudged the furnace door open and carefully peeked out. For the past ten minutes, he’d been debating wether or not to chance walking over to the water cooler near the top of the stairs. He was excessively thirsty and felt like he had sand in his mouth. Whatever had made him so sick earlier hadn’t killed him like he thought it would, but he was probably dehydrated to the point of needing an IV. It could be hours before help arrived, and that’s if the police believed any part of Noah’s story. He had his doubts.

Nothing jumped out at him when he opened the door. No movement, no unidentifiable sounds coming from within the shadows, no foreboding sense of dread. He was alone. A quick trip out was doable, but he wanted a weapon in case.

His knees and shoulders ached as he crawled out of the furnace, but stiff joints were the least of his problems. The area didn’t offer much of a weapon selection. One of the ironworker’s gang boxes was parked by the rooftop access stairs, but it was locked. The best protection Jeremy found was a two foot chunk of 1 1/2” PVC. It wouldn’t do him any good against a monster but having something in his hand gave him a small confidence boost.

With his pathetic weapon equipped, he zoomed over to the water cooler, dropped down in front of it and began pouring the water directly into his mouth. The cold water felt incredible traveling down his dry acid burned throat. It splashed all over his clothes and before long the whole front of his shirt was soaking wet, but he didn’t care. 

He barely noticed when the incandescent light mounted by the cooler began to flicker irregularly. A second later the other lights started flashing as well, cycling between uncomfortably bright and incredibly dim, almost like someone was repeatedly adjusting the voltage. Every light on the level, even those on different circuits, phased in and out simultaneously.

He let go of the cooler and grabbed the pipe as the nearest light dimmed again, ushering the darkness once more. The bulb’s glowing filament faded and was snuffed out. The remaining lights were quickly extinguished, removing any sense of security and plunging the area into blackness.

Jeremy tensed up and gripped the pipe nearly hard enough to crack it. The absence of light would signal the arrival of something terrible. He awkwardly stumbled through the dark and tripped over the footing of a support beam. His steel toed boot connected with the metal, and he cursed to himself. Both his words and the pang echoed outwards, telegraphing his location to anything that might be watching him from afar. Staying put wasn’t an option anymore. He only had two other choices, and neither were appealing. If he ventured downstairs, he risked encountering a monster disguised as his colleague. Running up to the roof would be moronic since he wouldn’t have an escape route if he got cornered up there.

As his mind worked and shorted out, a new sound prompted him to act without thinking.

Calm collected footsteps, drifting up from below and rapidly drawing closer.

Someone was coming up the stairs.


	11. Improper Bandsaw Use

_“Wake up Noah.”_

The words swam in Noah’s head. Teetering between awake and unconscious, he heard the voice but couldn’t register what was being said. A mildly unpleasant headache manifested and quickly elevated as he roused. Vaguely aware that he was laying on a flat surface, his chest felt tight, like he was being squeezed from behind. Something hard and cool was gently pressed against both sides of his head. It was familiar but it wasn’t the cause of his headache. The pain flourished in the front of his head, but he couldn’t pinpoint why.

Then he remembered the couple outside the gate. They hadn’t seen or heard him, and he’d been so busy shouting for help he hadn’t noticed the hidden figure creep up behind him. It came back to him in flashes; the sack over his head, the crack of the rifle, blindly stumbling about before falling down. Someone grabbed him by the ankles and then...nothing. His memory failed him. 

The higher ambient temperature and absence of wind told him he wasn’t outside anymore. Whoever abducted him seemed to be gone. Now he was inside, away from the cultists. One of the others had rescued him. He’d been saved. He was wrong about Bailey. How could he have been so paranoid? Bailey was his best friend, not a hostile replication. He’d seen that Noah needed help and taken action. No, that was putting it too lightly. Bailey risked his own life to save Noah’s. He was a true friend, and Noah felt unworthy to receive the help. Guilt gnawed at him. He’d been such a jerk. Sure, he’d gone practically crazy with fear, but that didn’t excuse his actions. He’d threatened to burn Bailey alive for God’s sake. What could he possibly say to make things right?

“I’m... s...sorry Bailey,” Noah slurred. “I didn’t mean what I said earlier. I didn’t mean it...”

Sorry alone wouldn’t cut it, he needed to give a sincere apology and take back the awful things he’d said. He had to look Bailey in the eye and admit that he’d been wrong.

The headache kicked in full force and he grimaced. Desperately in need of some pain killers, he instinctively reached up to touch the inflamed area. Nothing happened when he tried to lift his arm. 

He couldn’t move.

Panic jolted though him and his eyes snapped open in alarm.

The reason for his sudden paralysis became abundantly clear. He was tied to a small narrow table. Several thick fiberglass ropes wound tightly around his torso, pinning him down and binding his limbs to his sides. Terror rose inside him as he realized why he couldn’t move his head: it had been placed in a vice. The metal plates cradling his skull weren’t tightened enough to hurt, they only served to lock his head in position. He was rendered immobile and completely helpless, and before he could ask why, the horrific truth stared him right in the face.

Hovering two feet above his neck was the thin, belt like blade of a hydraulic bandsaw. 

Cameron’s blank icy gaze loomed into Noah’s view.

“Cam? What...what are you doing? Let me go!” Noah cried.

“Let you go? Why would I do that?” Cameron asked. He spoke calmly, as if kidnapping and restraining people was an everyday activity for him.

“It was you...you’re the one who attacked me at the gate!”

“I couldn’t let you get away. You may have everyone else fooled, but I see straight through your bullshit. I know what you _really_ are.” Cameron held the flamethrower and aimed the nozzle directly at Noah for emphasis. His left hand moved towards the saw’s power switch.

Only then did the situation truly hit home. 

Unless Noah broke free of his restraints, that blade would come down and slice through his neck.

“Please, don’t do this!” he begged. “I’m not what you think I am!”

“Really? Then who are you?”

Noah enjoyed reading about true crime, and a couple weeks ago he’d read a book about serial killers and psychopaths that included a section on how to act if you found yourself held captive. The book emphasized one very important fact: if a woman wanted to kill you, there was nothing you could say or do to change her mind, but men could be manipulated into letting their victims go. It wasn’t guaranteed to work, but if the victim got their would be killer to see them as a person, not an object, they had a chance of walking away alive. Cameron wasn’t a killer, Noah was sure of that, but his sanity was so far gone he might be unreachable. Noah’s chances were minimal, but he had to try.

“Why the hesitation? Do you not know the name of the person you took over? Is that it?” Cameron antagonized. He lightly ran his finger across the bandsaw blade. “I switched out the fine toothed blade for course to maximize the pain. It’ll rip your neck open in a second. I wonder...what’ll come spilling out? Nothing natural, I bet.”

“Listen to me, I’m not infected! If you do that...I won’t...I’ll just die! You’ll be a murderer!” Noah tried to bargain.

“No I won’t.” Cameron said nonchalantly. 

He flipped the switch and the small motor mounted on the saw sparked to life, accelerating the thin blade. It traveled around and around in its enclosure, the foot of exposed blade taunting Noah and amplifying his fear. It was locked in the open position, but once Cameron flipped off the safety switch it would begin its agonizingly slow descent towards Noah’s throat.

“Don’t kill me! I’m not a monster, I’m Noah Colton Williams!” Noah stammered and faltered, barely able to think through his terror. His mind was frantic and he couldn’t avert his eyes from the spinning blade but he forced himself to continue. His survival depended on it. “I...I’m twenty one years old and I live at 953 Cherrywood street in Hastings Minnesota with my parents, Jake and Laura. I’m an only child. I’m an apprentice pipe fitter working for Highland Mechanical out of Minnesota local 277. My girlfriend’s name is Alexis, we met junior year of high school. I like video games and dogs and hiking and...and....” he trailed off. 

Memories of loved ones surfaced and he lost control of his emotions. His tactic wasn’t working. Cameron’s mind was made up and nothing could change it.

Noah thought about his family, his friends, his girlfriend, his cats, and the crippling realization that he’d never see any of them again. Sobs built in his chest and salty tears begin to coast down the sides of his face, dripping down into his hair. He hadn’t cried like this since breaking his arm in fifth grade, but the tears flowed freely now and he didn’t bother fighting them. His words weren’t reaching Cameron, not even a little, and the small shard of hope he’d had was extinguished. Until now he’d managed to cling to a tiny shred of optimism, that minuscule chance that he’d escape and get help. He was braver than he initially thought, but now that his death was guaranteed, all he could do was weep.

Cameron’s stony, empty gaze broke and he smiled in a predatory fashion.

“Cute. The crocodile tears are a nice touch.” he sneered. “That’d probably work on some bleeding heart like Terry, but not me. Face the facts. You’re not getting away. That blade will saw through your neck and when you start to turn, I’ll light you up. And I hope your pal Jeremy is watching, because he’s next.”

He looked up towards the tenth floor and shouted into the void. “You hear that, Jeremy? I’m coming for you!” He aimed the flamethrower upwards and unleashed a plume of fire, momentarily lighting the underside of the floor above him, then turned back to Noah. “He’s up there, hiding. I sense him.”

Noah whimpered as Cameron approached him again.

“It’s time, Noah. If you’ve got any last words, say them now.”

“Please....please don’t do this. I want to live!” Noah begged. “I know you, Cam. You’re not a killer! I know you!”

“No, you don’t.”

Cameron flipped the switch and the blade started to come down.

Noah howled and thrashed, but the ropes held him taught. All he could do was move his feet and hands.

The blade creaked and groaned as it lowered several inches, then jumped up with a _clunk_ before resuming its descent. 

It got closer. Lower.

“No! No! Please, God! Please!” 

_Clunk._

It was a foot from his neck now. In less than thirty seconds he’d be feeling that rusty jagged blade cutting through his flesh and prayed that death would come quickly.

_Clunk._

Nine inches. Eight. 

Fresh tears spilled.

_Clunk._

Only five inches separated his neck from the blade.

Four.

Three.

_Clunk._

Noah spent his final moments thinking not of family or treasured childhood memories, but of the terrible last words he’d said to Bailey. The last words he’d ever say to him. _I don’t know what you are, Bailey. But you’re not my friend. Not anymore._ He’d seen the hurt and betrayal on Bailey’s face as the elevator doors slid shut, and now realized far too late that Bailey had been telling the truth. In his fear he’d abandoned his best friend and left him to die. Noah’s last conscious thought was that Bailey was dead, having suffered a horrible fate just like he was about to, that it was all his fault.

Cameron idly stood by, face devoid of emotion as he watched Noah meet his gruesome demise.

A splash of crimson spurted up as the blade kissed Noah’s neck. For several agonizingly long seconds his screams grew louder, then changed into a sound far more disturbing. A wet, gurgling wheeze issued from his ruined throat. Cameron knew what had happened. Noah could no longer scream because the blade had cut through his vocal chords. It made Cameron think of a sick, diseased animal choking on its own saliva. He cringed.

That fucking noise, that awful, disgusting noise....

Cameron couldn’t bear to listen to it. Why was it taking so long for Noah to die? Why couldn’t he die silently? 

“Make it stop!” Cameron clamped his hands over his ears, sure that sound would drive him mad if it continued for much longer.

The sound didn’t stop until the blade was nearly three quarters of the way through Noah’s neck. Only then did he go slack and fall silent.


End file.
